On the Fly at Barefoot-Dye: “Breaking Par with Charlie Rymer” Episode 36

Three in a row? Short par fours are just all the rage, I guess. This one’s a great kickoff to the back nine at the Dye Course at Barefoot. Water all the way up the left side. You don’t have much margin for error along the right side with all those bunkers in play. The hole wraps its way to the left and leads to an elevated green. Let’s see if we can get there in regulation, shall we?

This is the magnificent Barefoot Resort in North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. It’s a 72-hole facility. We’ve got golf courses here from Greg Norman, Davis Love III, Tom Fazio, and this is the 10th, the par four, by Pete Dye. Every year, the Dye Course hosts the Monday After the Masters Celebrity ProAm, hosted by Hootie and the Blowfish. I’ve had a chance to play in it pretty much every year. It has raised millions and millions of dollars for scholarships and junior golf programs across the entire state of South Carolina.

Normally it’s jam packed full of people when I’m out here. Today, it’s just me and you folks, and man, do I love it. It’s awfully peaceful. This 10th hole is a short par four. This is a good place if you’ve got a don’t go left shot. I’m going to try to demonstrate a don’t go left shot. I’m going to aim at the water up the left. I’ll put it back in my stance a little bit. I’m going to try to slice it and it’s my don’t go left. That didn’t go left. Anywhere right of the water is good, and that one’s good. I’m going to have a good shot at birdie here. You watch this. I might make birdie.

Man, I’ve got some good memories from this place. Played with Mia Hamm here, Kevin Sorbo. I played with Mark Bryan, Josh Kelly. There was a lot of cool celebrities here. One time I got to interview Mace Windu. I’m a big Star Wars fan, and Mace Windu played here. Samuel L. Jackson. He loves golf. He is a scary dude on the movie screen, but when you talk to him, he’s really cool. I was afraid when I was interviewing him, he was going to bust out his lightsaber, just like…. Blood going everywhere. I wouldn’t be much fun. But he was very nice. A lot of good memories here. They raise a ton of money in that Hootie and Blowfish Monday After the Masters every year. Fact, it is the largest single day fundraiser in the state of South Carolina every year. The guys in the band are spectacular. Known them a long time. Good guys, good place, good golf course.

So you can see I went right of the water, which was my goal, and it’s left me a pretty odd distance here. This is probably, I’m just eyeballing, I’m going to say 68 yards. I bet it’s within a yard or two of 68. A little downwind. That’s a number that intimidates a lot of people. But what I do from this distance is make a three-quarter swing, and that’s about 70 yards. So, let’s go with that. Good line. We’ll get the right instance. Yeah, I think we’re going to be okay there. I hope audio picked that up. Just the sound of that, that was pure right there. That was pure just the sound of it. The compression. Pure. Semi pure.

Well, I hadn’t been putting very good lately. I had a dream the other night that if I go back to putting the ball up in my stance and squeeze the putter with these three fingers in my left hand, that I’d start putting a little better. Open my stance, squeeze it. That didn’t work. Maybe I’ll have another dream tonight. One of these dreams will pay off. Oh, that was very athletic. Let’s try and get this out of here.

I’m going to keep dreaming. I’ve had it happen before where I had a dream, something stupid like squeezing with these three fingers, and it worked. Just never for more than a couple of days at a time. But we’re all dreamers in this game, so keep dreaming. If you find one that works, send it to me on social media. I’ll tell everybody about it and that I came up with it.

We’re holding steady here, folks, as we head back down to the heart of the Beach and drop in on one of America’s top public courses that’s got big things in store for 2024!