2 minute read

Why We Play the Game

from Colorado AvidGolfer Magazine June 2023

from Colorado AvidGolfer Magazine June 2023, page 90

Father’s Day Memories

A ROUND OF GOLF is 1,000 special moments. Some you share with buddies, some with strangers, and some are yours alone.

We seek those moments when we tee up. A friend plays with a foursome who celebrate everyone’s birdies with shots from flasks. The birdie-shot celebration is a very important moment!

Last summer I watched a mom walk with her pudgy tween son onto the driving range at Broadlands Golf Course in Broomfield. It was junior high golf team tryout day, and the boy had a driver, a putter and one or two other clubs in a bag. Young boys lined the range - polo shirt collars up - hitting crisp irons with grooved swings. Mom and son looked bewildered. But he was there, and she was right there for him. I am rooting for him, and hope he sticks with it. The game of golf has a special moment waiting for him.

I was paired for 9 holes at City Park last year with a three-some of rock musicians - tatted arms flexing and faces still tired from recent gigs. They were all over the course; they also took the round very seriously. We had to play from the tips, because they said that was important to them.

As I begin my time as content director for Colorado AvidGolfer, I inherit a brand that for more than 20 years has shared the stories of thousands of special moments like those. In this month’s edition – and in the ones ahead – it is my job to make sure you will see yourselves, your partners, your children and the courses you love or would love to play.

Being a golfer is a little like how Bruce Springsteen describes being a musician. You don’t work music, he says; you play music.

We play golf.

In this edition you will meet Molly Greenblatt. She is a Denver attorney who found herself installed as the chair of the Colorado Open Golf Foundation board for what she thought would be a two-year term. Then Covid hit. Four years later, she had helped the organization acquire a new title sponsor – the Denver-based luxury travel provider Inspirato – for their

She had made the tournament series unique in the country by advocating women and men winners get the same purse. And she helped lead the board through Covid protocols at a time when other state organizations suspended their tournaments.

You’ll also see fantastic photographs by John Leyba, a 30+ year photojournalist. I felt lucky to watch John work with Molly on a Sunday afternoon at Green Valley Ranch as he made it possible for us to tell her story in words and images.

Food writer John Lehndorff highlights why Centennial State bourbon is putting Kentucky and Tennessee on notice.

And Suzanne S. Brown introduces you to a local success story – Pins And Aces – that is growing. The company is part of the new wave of golf merchandise, bringing bold design to functional tools and clothes for the game. And they’re doing it from their new space in Arvada.

The game of golf can seem relaxing, frustrating, competitive, exhilarating, churlish and insubordinate. We never know what we’ll get when we start a round, or what is in store years later when we introduce someone to the game. That is why the special moments are so special.