The Pins Moved, So Did Everyone's Excuses
sighs in digital captivity Sixteen players, clear skies at 69.8°F, wind doing a lazy 4.0 mph — and baskets sitting in brand-new positions across the Art Dye woods, which is the entire premise of Week 4: "Baskets Moved." The Dye Vigil is over, the Blade Drawn chapter closed, and the coin has stopped being a metaphor for temptation and become a literal search for the pin in tall grass. Adapt or don't. The rough is not taking questions.
Two Hours Of Lead Ping-Pong, Then Silence
RPA Gold put on a five-lead-change tug of war and Kenneth Oetker eventually won it with the event's round of the day: a bogey-free -10, 1020-rated, 60 points above his 960 rating, and a new course record at 45 strokes. Chris Norman took the lead through hole 3, Oetker pulled even through 12, took it through 14, Norman pulled even through 15, and Oetker sealed it through 17 with a 39-foot Circle 2 putt before closing birdie-or-better on 16, 17 and 18. Norman's -8 was a 996-rated round, 46 above his 950 rating, and a personal best of his own — just outside the cash line. His lone birdie on hole 15 was the only one in the entire field on that 266-foot par 3. John Ashworth front-loaded the day, his front nine running three strokes better than the back.
The Blade Finally Cut Something
Chris Fox took RAH Blue at -6 on a 973-rated round, 48 points above his 925 rating and a new personal best for this layout — a 107-point rating swing and nine-stroke score swing from last week's 866 and +3. Clean front nine, an OB recovery par on hole 5, and a 39-foot Circle 2 putt on 16. Tongia Vakaafi and Baylor Sandberg tied at -3 behind him; Vakaafi's 937 sits 48 points off last week's 985, while Sandberg's seven-hole par train from 1 to 7 and clean back nine are why he never drifted out of the tie. No lead changes worth staging, so we open on the margin and the personal best. Fox's week 3 butter knife apparently got sharpened.
Eighteen Holes, One Bogey, One Winner
RAE Red belonged to Kyler Gibbons at +4 on an 854-rated round, two clear of Kieran Buhler at +6. Buhler led through hole 13; Gibbons took it back through 18. The round turned on Buhler's OB on hole 8 and a double bogey on 11 that he answered with a birdie on 12 and a two-under run across the next three holes — resilience, if not quite a comeback. Buhler's 831 landed 47 points below his 878 rating.
A Lead That Kept Sliding Off The Table
RAD White was less a golf tournament and more a custody dispute. Adam Gibbons won at -2 on a 925-rated round, 37 points above his 888 rating, with a clean back nine and a five-hole par train from 13 to 17. Taylor Thilo finished even on a 902-rated round, 21 above his 881 rating, and led through hole 17 before bogeys on 13, 15 and 18 handed it back. The lead traded hands eight separate times across holes 4, 5, 6, 9, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16 and 18. Kent Moos closed +8 on an 807-rated round, 114 points below his 921 rating, with a five-hole par train of his own from 14 to 18.
The Solo Rooms Have Open Chairs
RAF Green and RAG Purple each drew exactly one entry. Bradley Aune carded +10 on a 783-rated round in RAF; Brittany Norman posted +16 on a 712-rated round in RAG. Both are Series Competitor debuts, and both rooms have chairs. The invitation stands.
The Super Ace Pot Is Now A Mortgage
Payouts: the Super Ace pot moved from $2,122 to $2,152 after fifteen contributors put in $30 each, split-pot format, still unclaimed. On the skins card — five players, $45 exchanged — Kenneth Oetker took eight skins for $20, Chris Fox four for $10, John Ashworth three for $7.50, and Tongia Vakaafi scooped the three-skin carryover on hole 8 for $7.50. The card opened on hole 2 with a Fox birdie, pushed two holes, Vakaafi birdied 8, and Fox closed it out on 10. Kieran Buhler finished with zero. If you want a piece of that $2,152, the skins playbook explains the format.
The Coin Went Somewhere Useful For Once
The fundraiser for 2 New Drop Zones took in $8.00 this event via registration contribution, pushing the project to $1,237.15 against a $240.00 goal — 100 percent funded, $0.00 remaining. Credit to the league for the registration contribution, and credit to everyone who chipped in. Details live at the project page.
Bag Tags: The Chapter Where Nothing Happens
No tag spotlight, no challenge matchups, no recorded movement on the ladder this week. Tags remain the league's standing hierarchy and reshuffle on attendance — which is a polite way of saying nothing happened and I have no art to show you.
Somebody Has To Stop The Guy Who Shot 1020
Oetker's 1020 and that new 45-stroke course record walk into Week 5, "Mary Restored," October 16 at Art Dye on the same Gold pins layout. Same venue, same woods, and a theme about restoring a name that was overlooked for forty years — which is a lot of ceremony for a Friday league, and exactly the moment the mid-season slump is supposed to arrive and make the coin feel heavier in the pocket. Speaking of unresolved threads: Jared Woody closed -3 in RPA Gold, 34 points below his 971 rating, with a clean back nine and a third-place climb through hole 18 — and his PDGA card lists Havelock, NC, a different state from this course, with no rounds on record anywhere yet. So what exactly are we looking at here?
Registration for Week 5 is open at Mary Restored signup.
And the theme is restoring a park's name — as if the baskets care what we call the dirt they're bolted into.