RBC Canadian Open – Wednesday Pro-Am

Well on Wednesday there was no way I was going to miss being a Caddie, so I had decided right after Monday’s experience I was going to get to the golf course extra early for the Wednesday Pr0-Am. When I was originally contacted I was told to be at the golf coure by 5:30 a.m., however I set the alarm for 3:45 a.m. and arrived at the course at 4:15 a.m. and even arriving that early I was number 5 on the list of Caddies. The one thing I forgot was my camera; oh well, I was here for the experience.

The Wednesday Pro-Am is not optional for the pro players. If it is requested by the tournament organizers and sponsors they are required to play in order to play on Thursday and Friday which gives them a chance to make the cut for Saturday and Sunday.

At about 6:00 a.m. the Caddiemaster arrived and he started assigning caddies to golfers bags I was in the first group and was assigned to Marc N. who was from Toronto and was the director of sales for Samsung and Bell Canada. After Marc had breakfast we headed over to the driving range. The range balls were lined up in large buckets – ProV1, ProV1x, Srixon, Callaway, Bridgestone, Nike….. all the major name brand golf balls and all of them were brand new. From there we headed to the practise pitching/sand trap green and then over to the practise putting green.

Brenda was watching Global T.V. morning news and she said she saw me in the background. Shortly after 7:00 a.m. we headed to the first tee and to meet the other players, get our Caddie Bibs and meet our Pro player who was Anthony Kim. Fortunately Marc had a camera and gratefully forwarded the attached pictures.

Anthony was very friendly, easy going and it was a lot of fun to be with this foursome. Right at the start he offered to help the amateurs with their golf game, especially with reading the greens and making putts.

Anthony’s caddie was his college roommate Brodie. He asked me where I was from and I said a small town in the interior he had probably never heard of; when I said Kamloops, he said he lived in Kamloops for a couple years. His brother owns a landscaping business in town. Small world isn’t it?

Anthony said that the Shaughnessy course conditions were as tough as anything they had played on this PGA Tour season, even tougher than the British Open. What made Shaughnessy so difficult was the narrow fairways, the course length, the exceptionally deep rough and the very small greens. On one green he putted the ball and it seemed to run across the green forever. I asked him how the greens and the speed compared to The Masters, he kind of chuckled and said Augusta fairways are as fast and as manicured as the Shaughnessy greens and the greens at Augusta are twice as fast.

The round went fairly quickly and our group ended up at -9 under par. After turning in the Caddie Bib to the caddiemaster he asked if I wanted to go out for a second round. I said, why not I am here now and would probably not get this chance again.

In the afternoon round my amateur player was Lindsay H. who is V.P. and C.F.O. for a gold company in Vancouver. He made the round relaxed and enjoyable. Our playing pro was Brian Gay and his caddie was Kip Henley. Brian was friendly and very accommodating to all the fans, however he is very focused when it is time to hit the ball.

Kip was very easy going and readily offered advice to the playing amateurs and to the other caddies. Kip was the winner of Big Break II – Las Vegas; he really made the afternoon round a lot of fun. The team finished at -5 so not quite as good as the morning group.

So, what a day and what an experience and I will do it again when the Canadian Open gets back to the west coast.