Whew!!! What a week! We arrived in Waco, TX on Wednesday morning. Took a quick walk around Cameron Park and checked the course out. Front nine is short and slightly tricky... all holes are deuces with the right shot. Back nine was long and full of road and water hazards.

Right after walking the course we saw the California boys pull up in their motor home. It doesn't touch the Winnebago for luxury, but the Cali-boys are experienced tour professionals and have everything fine tuned. We ended up hanging out with them for the next several days. The Cali-boys are better known as Harold Hampton, Steve Rico, Roger Canselor, and traveling in his own vehicle was Ron Klein. The boys also had a Sony Playstation so we ended up playing soccer and racing games a lot.

Anyway, we did the usual stuff to prepare for the tournament on Saturday and Sunday. Here's how the tournament went.....

'Twas about 90 degrees out with little wind, sun shining but lots of shady areas on the course. Most tees and pins had shade close by.

Winner: Ron Russell (again), $1375
2nd: Tie - Scott Stokely and Steve Rico, $690 each
4th: Barry Schultz, $460
5th: Seth Lawhead, $380
6th: Harold Hampton, $320
7th: Todd Branch, $280
13th: Al Schack, $140

63 total Men's Open players:
Russell shot about -38
Harold shot -26
Todd shot -25
Al shot -19

Al: -6,-2,-9,-2
Todd: -7,-5,-8,-5

Women's Open
Winner: Juliana Bower, $350
2nd: Lesli Herndon, $210
3rd: Wendy Rose Hambleton, $70

Men's Pro Master
1st: Joel Kelly, $645

Men's Grand Master
1st: Don McGregor, $350

The first 3 rounds were 21 holes each. Then there was a cut to the top third... cut was -16. The 4th round was 18 holes. The back nine had a different pin position on most holes, some holes even had 4 pin placements. Each round the placements got more difficult. Best round of the tournament was a -13 by Mitch McClellan, a pro masters player.

Other stuff.... Todd and Al are now both qualified for the U.S. Open!

After the tournament we decided to start heading north toward St. Louis and the McCormack homestead. Seventy miles from St. Louis we were pulled over by a State Trooper. He claimed that I had swerved. I hate to tell you but Winnebago's aren't very aerodynamic and when it's windy out, well, THEY SWERVE A LOT!! Anyway... I smiled and said "Oh?" He asked me where we were coming from, where we were going, I had to explain to him what disc golf is. He asked if we had any drugs in the camper. I said "No." He said we were free to go.

As I started to get back in the camper, the trooper asked me "Do you mind if I search the inside of your vehicle?" I told him he could, but Hyzer didn't think it was a good idea. He did a bit of growling and mean sounding barking. The officer asked me to "remove your dog from the vehicle and leash him." I did.

After the officer didn't find any 50 lb. bags of cocaine or opium he finally decided to let us go. We went.

Now we are getting ready to drive up to Lac du Flambeau for the Upper Midwest team challenge. I hear that some of the teams have been stacked in order to de-throne team Michigan... last year’s champions of which Al and I are members.

Wish us luck.... watch for some wild pictures from Waco later.

-Todd