Valero Texas Open

I drove to the La Cantera resort on Monday morning, not only is there a hotel and golf resort but a huge mall and a theme park all on site. As I pulled into the player's parking lot I was greeted by a petrol station as the sponsors of this weeks event are Valero. Valero owns and operates petroleum refineries across America that produce nearly 10% of the United States daily fuel needs, they also have a network of petrol stations and are based in San Antonio.

I hit some balls on the range and then headed out for the pro-am. I really enjoyed the day, my group were really friendly and we had a good laugh. The buggies had fantastic GPS, which helped, as there were a number of blind tee shots and doglegs. The course has some big elevation changes as it is carved out of the hills, this gave me some great views of downtown San Antonio and the Six Flags theme park. Our team total was 20 under par, which was a fantastic score but wasn't the winning score.

On Wednesday I went sightseeing to the Alamo and the River walk. The Alamo was a home to missionaries and Indian converts for seventy years before the Spanish military stationed a cavalry unit there in the early 1800's. The Alamo is mainly remembered for its role in the Texas Revolution in 1836, a small number of Texan and Tejano volunteers defended the Alamo against the Mexican army for 13 days before being overwhelmed. It is remembered because of what is seen as a heroic struggle against all the odds. The River walk, is a nice walk but the river is flanked by restaurants so was very quiet, I imagine it gets busy on an evening.

The weather this week was hot and humid which was a lot more pleasant than last week but was a different type of hard work. I played in the last group on Thursday afternoon with Jason Allred and Kevin Chappell. It was a mixed day, where a couple of shots that weren't that far off line were costly. I didn't get off to the best start on Friday but made four birdies in five holes around the turn that got me back in a position to make the cut but I needed a couple of more birdies and they didn't come.

On Saturday I played a pro-am on the other course at the resort, it was a relaxed outing with players in carts and allowed to wear shorts, I didn't as my legs look like OB posts! The format was a "shamble" where the amateurs tee off, pick the best drive from the group and everyone plays there ball out from there for the rest of the hole and then I played my ball, as a team we were 17 under par which again I thought was a good score.

It was too expensive to change my fight to Saturday night so I kept my original ticket and flew into Las Vegas at 9pm on Sunday with the city all lit up like a Christmas tree