Mark’s Monday

Crans on Sunday

This weeks tournament is the Mercedes Benz Championship in Cologne, Germany. I played in this event last year and it is a really good tournament to play. It is a restricted field with only 78 players and no cut, which is a good thing with how I have been playing!! It is always a strong field with it being made up of the top players from this current year and the remainder from exemption categories. Being in the winners category, I get a start.

I had another disappointing week last week in Switzerland, missing the cut narrowly by two shots. I had one over par the first day, then got it going on day two being three under for the day with five holes remaining, two of those being reachable par fives. Then disaster, I hit a poor five iron on the 13th, a par three, it got caught by a wind gust which you get up in the mountains, and ended up on a bare lie under tree branches. From there I over hit into a greenside trap, then three putted for a triple bogey six. It seems like every time I hit a bad shot at the moment I get heavily punished, and when you are struggling with the putter it makes it even tougher. I made one more birdie but it wasn’t good enough and missed the cut. In my experience the toughest times in golf are when you are playing well but not getting rewarded. My tee to green stats have been very encouraging and it feels like I have had a lot of control with my driving and iron play, but it just shows how important the putting and short game becomes.

We had a great week though, Crans Sur Sierre was a spectacular place, right in the middle of the Swiss Alps. We stayed in a small village there, walking distance to the course and all of the restaurants, the place had a real buzz to it. If you are going to miss a cut, this was probably the best place to have a weekend off.

Occasionally on the European Tour there will be a Saturday pro-am for sponsor’s clients and they require pros who miss the cut to play. They pay you a little bit of money and it is a great chance to meet some good people and on this occasion there was a spectacular dinner on that night at the Hostelerie Du Pas de L’ours, one of the nicest hotels in Crans.

See you next week