Wednesday, I told you about the upcoming Sparty & Friends field trip that Mrs. Mizerle06 and I would be making to Thursday’s first round of The Players Championship at Sawgrass.  So, early yesterday morning, after we’d scalped a couple of tickets (left) the evening before, I sacrificed my right arm for parking, we lathered up with sunscreen, and then chickened out trying to sneak our cell phones and cameras inside (on our way into the course from the massive sprawling parking lot, everyone with “Sawgrass” printed on their shirts was screaming “NO CAMERAS!  NO CELL PHONES!!” at us and they were doing pat-downs and had wands out to detect metallic substances while we attempted entry – very scary and intimidating). 

Anywho, as soon as we traversed the Walk of Champions and entered Sawgrass, we both had the same reaction – this was nothing like what we expected.  We agreed that the atmosphere felt like a fair; there were concessions setup along pathways and gift shops all around.  The Walk of Champions dumped us onto the course right at the 17th hole.  We decided what better way to start than sit on the hill, chill out for a second, and get our bearings while we watched a few pros drop their ball into the drink all around the famous island green. 

The first golfer we saw as soon as we picked a cushy spot of grass turned out to be Sergio Garcia…and immediately became Mrs. Miz’s favorite golfer.  He safely landed his ball on the island as did the other two members of his group (Zach Johnson and K.J. Choi).  We watched these guys all two-putt and decided to hang for a few more minutes to see if there would be any hysterics in the next couple of groups (George McNeill, Steve Flesch, and Stuart Appleby; and Tim Petrovic, D.A.Weibring - who was missing from the trio, and Bo Van Pelt).  Everyone hit safely onto the green and only one of these guys birdied…it might have been Petrovic. 

There wasn’t much of a crowd following Petrovic and Van Pelt, so we followed them over to the 18th tee to watch them tee off on the par 4.  It was pretty wild standing almost within arm’s reach of these guys and hearing the sound of the ball on the club face followed by the immediate whistle sound the ball made as it rocketed down the fairway. 

At that point, we had a game plan: find Tiger.  He tee’d off at 8:10 am on the 10th tee and when we were traveling the Walk of Champions, guys were hawking rentable XM radios to us while randomly yelling out to anyone that would listen the current location of said Tiger.  We knew that as we were walking in, he was on the 18th, so we figured he must be on about 3 or 4 by this point – which means we should head for 5.  We started our trek to 5 and reached the green after a few minutes and discovered that Peter Lonard, Charlie Wi, and Cliff Kresge were the group currently attempting their approach shots.  This group was also known as 3 groups before Tiger. 

We weren’t the only ones who had the idea of parking ourselves at a green to await Tiger’s arrival; the crowd steadily grew with each new group that came through the 5th green (Boo Weekly, Trevor Immelman, and Fred Funk – a local that received a lot of golf claps; then Richard Johnson, Johnson Wagner, and Scott Verplank).  We were watching up the fairway and noticed the huge mass of humans that started heading our direction.  We couuldn’t clearly see the three golfers (Tiger, Justin Leonard, and Ernie Els) at that point, but were confident that with that gallery, Tiger was among them.  We were right.

Tiger hit his shot onto the green but it took a couple of bounces and came to a halt approximately 1 to 2 feet off of the back of the green – just a few feet away from us.  Tiger, Ernie, and Justin walked up and everyone just started randomly clapping.  Mrs. Miz asked if Tiger’s presence elicits spontaneous clapping and I answered “Yes…or a humble bow also works.”  We watched Tiger brilliantly two-putt for par…so did Els and Leonard if I’m not mistaken.

We wanted to experience Tiger at the tee but instead of fighting the crowd and following over to the 6th, we decided to head up to the 7th.  Amazingly, the crowd that had amassed early at the 5th green just like us, didn’t do the same at the 7th tee.  So, when we got up there, we were just among a few people.  We found a shady spot to sit about 10 yards down the fairway and right at the rope.  Again, we saw the two groups before Tiger’s before he stepped up to hit his drive.  Being just down the fairway allowed us to really hear the ball whiz by – it was pretty amazing.

Mrs. Miz’s favorite golfer was only two groups behind Tiger’s so we chillaxed in our shady spot for a little while longer.  The group in between Tiger’s and Sergio’s consisted of Davis Love III, Mike Weir, and David Toms (I was really surprised at how many of the golfers’ names I knew and faces I recognized, especially not being much of a golf fan).  Sergio got up to the 7th tee and drove one right into the bank of a sand trap.  He immediately started cursing loudly; I almost expected him to apologize for his French…except that it was all in Spanish.  Then, he threw his club at his bag and purposely knocked over the bag. 

We joined the Sergio gallery for the rest of the 7th hole and watched him hit his ball out of the sand with a motion similar to swinging a bat (he stood below the ball and the club head was almost as high as his waist).  Garcia, Johnson, and Choi all managed to two-putt for par on 7.

We were feeling hungry and headed back over towards 17 and 18 to hit up some concessions ($5 for a hotdog, chips, and Coke – not too bad).  We ate our grub under a shade tree at 18 while watching Vijay Singh, Charles Howell III, and Charley Hoffman tee off.  Then, we headed back over to the hill overlooking 17 to see if we could get lucky and see one drop in the water hazard.  No luck again as Steve Lowery, Daniel Chopra, Paul Goydos, John Sended, Luke Donald, Ian Poulter, Tommy Armour III, Dudley Hart, and Justin Rose all landed safely on the green. 

By this time, Tiger and Sergio had finished their rounds and were in the clubhouse.  We still hadn’t seen Phil Mickelson yet.  Luckily for us, he had an afternoon tee time at 1:20 on the 1st so he had just gotten started.  We hadn’t seen much of the west side of Sawgrass so we headed in that direction in search of Phil and his group (Dustin Johnson and Adam Scott).  We found them and a huge gallery – presumably everyone that had been following Tiger earlier in the morning – at 3.  We watched Phil make a great putt at 3 and attempted to beat the gallery over to the 4th green.  Instead, we walked too far and ended up at the 5th green again.  We’d already watched him putt and wanted to see him drive so we parked ourselves at the 6th tee and waited.  In the meantime, we saw Cameron Beckman, Fred Couples, Will Mackenzie, Geoff Ogilvy, Padraig Harrington, and Steve Stricker tee off at 6.  Oh, and Stricker’s caddy yelled at me to stop walking before little Stevie could hit the golfball.  Apparently, golfers can’t swing a club if someone’s walking within 30 yards.  Who knew?

Anyway,  we hung out until Phil hit his shot straight down the fairway at 6 and decided we were tiring.  We headed back over to our spot on the hill at 17 to try and catch some final mayhem.  The craziest thing we saw was a hawk grab a fish out of the water hazard and fly it up to its nest right along the 17th.  Mark Wilson, Greg Craft, Stephen Ames, Carl Pettersson, Hunter Mahan, Aaron Baddeley, Camilo Villegas, Rory Sabbatini, Robert Allenby, Angel Cabrera, Kenny Perry, and another local boy in Jim Furyk all hit safely onto the island.  Only Furyk provided some excitement with a bounce that cleared the green and landed his ball on the skinny path out to the island within a couple of feet of the water.

After checking out the prices in the gift shop, we determined the only things we’d take with us were Mrs. Miz’s sunburn on her shoulders, her new love for Sergio, and the grass stuck to the sunscreen on the back of my legs.  In all, even though neither of us were golf fans, it was a great time.  We were shocked that such a large and beautiful piece of land like Sawgrass was within a 2-3 mile straight line from our house.  The course was very easy to navigate and looked great. 

This morning, I heard that Tiger had parked his boat nearby on the Intracoastal Waterway.  I decided I should probably take the chance to check out what $20 Million looks like when it’s floating.  The best and most concise way to describe it would probably be “155 feet of pure awesomeness.”  It seriously towers over everything anchored nearby.  Below is a shot of the full yacht (click on the pic and you’ll be able to zoom in a bit).
 

I decided to do a little recon work on the Woods’ boat and found this article about the little dingy.  Notice at the bottom of the second page, there’s a bit about the workout equipment:

The port-side twin guest cabin is converted to a gym, with a cutout in the overhead above the TechnoGym treadmill—which still looks like it will be a tight squeeze for the 6’2” golfer. He may have to settle for a workout on the Evolution exercise bicycle or with the stylish black-and-silver rubberized free weights that range from five to 45 pounds.

Continuing on to page 3, the top deck is described:

Then again, it seems Woods might prefer to get his exercise outdoors. There had once been talk of a fully gimbaled pool table in Hull 026’s sky lounge, but instead, the yacht carries all her toys on the top deck, including three SeaDoos, two oceangoing kayaks, and a pair of Vespa scooters. They’re all stowed aft of a large bar with a marble countertop, a stainless steel Lynx barbecue grill, an eight-person Jacuzzi, and teak chaise lounges covered with (you guessed it) beige-and-white striped cushions.

Well, care to guess who just happened to be occupying that “Evolution exercise bicycle” and who else was simultaneously perusing a newspaper while sitting at the “large bar with a marble countertop” (see below…and again, click on the pic to be able to zoom in)?

That’s right; wifey Elin was getting some cardio in while caddy Stevie was soaking up a few rays.  Here’s a closer shot of each in action:

I hope you all enjoyed the Sparty & Friends field trip to The Players Championship at Sawgrass along with the little side excursion to South Ponte Vedra Beach to check out what luxury really looks like. 

By the way, sparty, I’ll have an expense report with about $150 is receipts on your desk this afternoon…

Mizerle06 is a senior writer and editor here at Sparty & Friends.  All priase may be sent to mizerle@spartyandfriends.com while haters can drop a note to sparty@spartyandfriends.com.

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