Bird Golf Academy boasts the “Ultimate Golf Learning Experience.” How can they make such a claim? Bird Golf has 350 years of teaching experience among their PGA/LPGA staff and a one or two student to teacher ratio. This small ratio gives each student a much more personalized and focused learning experience.
Each personalized golf learning experience is tailored for the student’s specific needs and requirements.
Methods
Bird Golf Academy employs fundamental teaching methods with help simplify the learning experience and avoid giving the student too much information or too much to think about. Each student’s custom learning plan includes tailored home practice plans, application of learned skills, playing lessons, and use of modern digital and/or video analysis.
Locations
Bird Golf Academy is available in Arizona, California, the Carolinas, Florida, Georgia, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Vermont.
There are comprehensive packages available for students including high end golf courses and first class accommodations. Photo above: Sheraton Grand at Wild Horse Pass in Phoenix, Arizona.
School Categories
Bird Golf offers numerous packages for men, women and juniors. Packages include several options for 3-5 day schedules which offer from 24 to 40 hours of individual instruction.
Final Thoughts
For golfers who want to seriously improve their skills and enjoyment of the game, Bird Golf Academy is a fantastic choice with convenient locations around the country.
The HOG World Tour recently made a 2nd trip to Temecula, California and Pechanga Resort and Casino to check out the new expansion. This is a follow-up review of the resort. The last tour stop at Pechanga was back in 2015. You can find the original Pechanga Resort review here. Onsite is the “Journey at Pechanga” golf course, which was also reviewed here at Hooked on Golf Blog back in 2015.
Already the top Resort/Casino in California, Pechanga invested roughly $300 million to double its occupancy and make tremendous strides in expanding their resort experience. Let’s take a look at what’s new.
Expansion Quick Hits
- Additional 568 rooms/suites.
- New luxury spa
- 70,000 square foot event space
- 4.5 acre pool complex
- Two new restaurants
Sweet Suite
I was excited to stay in one of the new suites in the new tower. The layout of the suite featured a separate family room with a master bedroom. The whole suite was wrapped in windows which overlooked the golf course, Journey at Pechanga. See below.
And here’s the master bedroom below. What you don’t see in the photo is the master bath, which is huge, and the jumbo flat screen TV which is located where guests lounging in bed can enjoy it.
Pool
The old pool at Pechanga was not much to write home (or a blog post) about. The new 4.5 acre pool area is tremendous. It features adult and kid’s pools, bars, food, slides, fountains, and terrific gazebos. Below is a shot of the huge, adult pool.
Pool food and beverage services are terrific. My family spent two straight days there and enjoyed great food and adult/kid beverages while lounging in our personal gazebo.
Be warned! The pool is not a calm and quiet place to relax. There is DJ music playing constantly and often times it gets loud. It was too loud and obnoxious for my personal taste and I was disappointed that there wasn’t a “quiet area.” But if you want to party at the pool and enjoy hours and ours of “boom tss boom tss boom tss” music, you’ll dig it.
Junior Golf
This time around I was thrilled to get my 6 year old boy into the Journey at Pechanga Junior Golf academy. He had a terrific time learning some of the basics of the game and getting some great instruction. The instruction staff was terrific and made it really fun and interactive for the kids. After one lesson my boy’s swing already looks better than mine.
Spa & Fitness Center
I hit the fitness center for some calorie burning and cardio building. The fitness center is well equipped for the needs of any gym rat. I was very pleased to find a Peloton bike which I took advantage of.
After some long hours at the pool and then the fitness center, I was able to get a well needed massage at the resort spa. The spa facilities are huge, and feature private saunas, pools, steam rooms, as well as individual or couples massages. The whole spa experience is as good as you’ll find. I was thrilled to get rid of those pesky knots in my lower back! That will help the golf swing for sure.
Food and Beverage
There are numerous terrific restaurants at Pechanga. My family enjoyed Italian at “Paisanos,” sushi at the award winning “Umi Sushi and Oyster Bar,” and some Irish pub style food and brews at “Kelsey’s.” In the mornings we would hit the “Lobby Bar & Grill” for the best latte I’ve ever had, and some solid breakfast offerings.
Casino
The casino space at Pechanga is huge. It rivals large Las Vegas resorts. But size isn’t everything. The casino is super clean, well laid out, thoughtfully designed and enjoyable. Playing games of chance or simply enjoying “adult” activities is terrific at Pechanga.
Architecture
The lobby of the resort is architecturally tremendous. I found myself wanting to photograph the lobby more than anything else at the resort. It’s quite stunning.
The architecture of the Journey at Pechanga golf course clubhouse is amazing as well.
Final Thoughts
Pechanga was already the #1 casino/resort in California. They didn’t need to make a move, but they did. Pechangla doubled down and hit the jackpot. New additions like the new tower suites, pool area, and spa make Pechanga a must-go destination. Forget Vegas, especially if you’re from California!
I may actually play golf in 2020. The shoulder hasn’t really hurt for a good month or so now. You have NO idea how awesome it is to not have shoulder pain. Having been in pain for a solid 1.5 YEARS, I’m thankful for modern medicine.
I’m sure when I finally pick up a golf club, the swing will be very bad. My club-head speed right now has to be about 15mph. Not sure any golf company makes golf balls soft enough for that. But hopefully I’ll eventually be able to get that speed back up to where I can hit real golf shots, and play real golf balls like the 2020 Bridgestone Golf Tour B lineup. Now I’ve got some proto’s to test out.
When will this happen? Not soon. We are in about a six month frost delay in northern Utah. It’s called winter. The golf clubs are in storage and the powder skis are in the trunk. When the snow melts and the courses open, I’ll be trying out those swings.
Today the golf world lost perhaps the most famous and well known golf course architect in history, Pete Dye. Pete Dye is famous for his, shall we say, “creative” architectural ideas like the island green 17th hole at TPC Sawgrass (photo below of me teeing off about to lose 3 balls and shoot a 9), or his “volcano bunkers” at the Dye Course at French Lick Resort (other photo below of me standing atop a volcano bunker). Most famously Dye loved to use railroad ties to border terrain features and create more intimidation for the player. It worked.
Dye has produced many proteges who in their own right are very successful course architects.
I’ve had the pleasure (and pain) of playing a few Dye designs including TPC Sawgrass Stadium Course, French Lick Resort’s Dye Course, and my favorite: Teeth of the Dog in the Dominican Republic (photo below). There’s even a Dye course here in northern Utah, about 30 minutes east. That one has a hole that’s 805 yards. Driver mid-iron… Right.
It’s surely a sad day for the golf world, but the good news is these memorable courses will live on, and continue to remind us about how unique, creative, and innovative Pete Dye was.
Sad to say I never had the opportunity to meet the man. Wish I had.
RIP
As of tomorrow, I’ll be 10 months removed from shoulder surgery for a torn bicep tendon, torn rotator cuff, torn labrum and bone spur removal. I was in a sling for about six weeks following the surgery, and did rehab for about six months. During the course of my recovery I developed “frozen shoulder,” a condition where scar tissue and inflammation builds up causing extreme soreness and stiffness. That condition can take up to several years to subside.
The majority of the injury happened in the summer of 2018, but there seemed to be damage occurring in the previous year or two before that. I’d experienced shoulder pain dating back to early 2018 and through until November 2019. Having been in pain for so long, I’m happy to report that as of about 2-3 weeks ago I haven’t been noticing any. It can still be stiff if I push it working out or doing activities which stretch the limits of my arm’s mobility.
It has now been 13 months since I played golf. If I try the motions of a golf swing I can tell that I don’t have much in terms of release. Release meaning the extension of the golf swing following impact. Once my arms get about 1/3 of the way to the finish I can feel that frozen shoulder tightness. That’s not great, but a few months ago I could not have gotten to that position.
I also had a little boo boo this summer while hiking. I fell and dislocated my other shoulder. That one has a torn labrum and an indented ball, the ball part of the ball and socket. That means it will likely dislocate easier. I could have chosen surgery to fix the damage, but I’ve opted to try and build up strength first and see how that goes.
Winter is here in northern Utah, so I wouldn’t be playing any golf this time of year anyway unless I traveled south. So not a huge loss in terms of golf at this point. I’m hoping that after the 5-6 month winter my flexibility will have improved enough to start trying to make some golf swings. I doubt I could hit a ball farther than 40-50 yards at this point.
That’s all fine. I’m in full on SKI mode now. Bring on the powder. I’m working on a new site for skiing (and other mountain sports). It’s under construction, but the site “Hike.Ski” is somewhat up and running. It’s an interesting domain. Not a “dot com.” Just type in Hike.Ski into the browser URL. The full site is https://hike.ski.
I’ll report again when there are new developments on the shoulder. Thanks for your patronage.
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