Before the days get too short, before the nights grow too cold, before morning dew becomes frost, we at Styled to a Tee had wanted to play some fall golf with friends.
The plan was simple: Wait until the height of fall foliage to have our first golf outing — The Styled to a Tee Invitational, and pick a destination that might be suitably inspiring.
Our logic: What better time of year to play if you get lucky and catch a temperate day?
Fall golf in the Northeast (where we’re located) can be a magical experience with the contrasts of green fairways and burnt oranges, yellows and reds creating an almost impressionistic scene. And, on weekdays at least, you have the course virtually to yourself and, besides having to look for balls under fallen leaves, you can zip through in three hours, playing a round that might have taken five in the summer. The seasonally crisp air invites golfers to layer up and wear those cashmere sweaters and wool pants that don’t see the light of day as much as they should. And a fall golf date would set us apart from the plethora of outings that clog the Monday schedules from May through September.
Of course, the regionalized financial "crisis" has got everyone on DefCom 5 and so we had the not-entirely-unexpected last-minute regrets. But if we can look forward on how we might one day look back: Won’t we all remember a Monday of fall golf in the Hudson Valley and new friends made rather than another day chained to desk and phone?
Congratulations to David Sweedler, who had the low gross with an envy-inducing 79 highlighted by an eagle 3 on the par-five eighth. Sweedler, a dynamic golf and fashion industry executive, is modest to a tee even if his game is not. Chris Tschupp, actor and onetime Calvin Klein model, took home the Nat Nast Styled to a Tee champion’s blazer for carding an 86, adjusted with a handicap to low net of 72. As we put the blazer on Chris, we reminded him he also happened to be the low 40-long.
