Mesa Verde’s Greens: Slowed by the Rain?

Reputations die hard at Mesa Verde Country Club, home of this week’s Uniden LPGA Invitational and, on occasion, the most unforgiving greens this side of concrete.

In years past, Mesa Verde greens have been accused of everything except manslaughter. Too hard. Too fast. Too fill-in-the-blank. To hear some of the LPGA players, you’d think they had spent their Mesa Verde rounds putting on freshly waxed kitchen floors.

“With this golf course it was not so much the speed (of the greens),” Jan Stephenson said. “The speed has always been excellent. It’s too hard underneath. When they’re this elevated, you have to be a high-ball hitter.”

Nothing wrong with that, except that some players, Stephenson included, have golf swings that thrive on nerve, not loft. “I like to kind of go for it,” Stephenson said.

Do that at Mesa Verde and you usually need a search committee to find your ball.

But that was before the February rains came and turned Mesa Verde’s greens into kittens. Compared to previous visits, Stephenson said, the course has never looked better. Mind you, it’s not like hitting onto a pillow, but at least no one is accusing the greenskeepers of using asphalt.

“The rain has helped the golf course,” Stephenson said. “It’s much greener than it’s ever been and the greens are holding and they’re at great speed.”

Stephenson had just completed her first practice round when she said that. Her opinion may change after today’s opening round, where a week’s worth of sun and heat should make the greens drier, slicker and more challenging.

“Some of the fastest we play all year,” said Bonnie Lauer, last year’s Uniden champion.

Pat Bradley: “They’re pretty much running true to form. They’re not holding as well as you might think.”

If so, Stephenson will find herself in a familiar position, trying to make peace with her putter.

For whatever reason--and for the moment, she tends to blame a fickle putting machine that apparently altered her stroke--Stephenson has suffered from three years’ worth of yips.

It wasn’t that she never practiced. Stephenson and the putting machine became best pals, but then a battery burned out, or something like that, she said, and before you could say three-putt, everything was going right of the cup.

During a tournament in England, one newspaper was kind enough to keep track of her three-putts--and remind her of the misses daily. Several television stations joined in the Jan Stephenson putt watch. The official total: 13 three-putts in four rounds.

Not exactly a confidence builder, but Stephenson said her putting is getting better. “The first two rounds are so important to me,” she said. “If I can get off to a good start (her chances of winning) are excellent.”