The Michigan Ryder Cup: 5 Years of Memories

Read time: 5 minutes

Welcome to The Ascend Archives Tuesday Tale, a weekly newsletter where I share a story about a transformation, revelation, or change in thinking that has helped improve an aspect of my life.

“That was genuinely the most fun I’ve had in a long time” - Luis after the 2019 Michigan Ryder Cup

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The idea for a golf trip started with 2 close friends from Michigan.

We had just graduated college, started working in the real world, and needed something to look forward to. But we wanted to do this golf trip the right way.

3 day weekend. 4 rounds of golf. Split into teams. Ryder Cup scoring.

Our immediate friend group at the time was not that into golf. So we had to look beyond them to gather 8 guys for the trip.

I had recently run into a guy from my fraternity at Jimmy Johns on Wells St in Chicago. We weren’t very close at Michigan but he invited me to join his rec basketball league so I returned the favor and invited him to the golf trip. Then, I asked if his roommates (also went to Michigan) were golfers as well. Sure enough, they were and we were up to 6.

We scrapped together two extra guys and made our way down to PGA National in West Palm Beach. With the majority of the guys going to school at Michigan, we named it “The Michigan Ryder Cup”.

I honestly didn’t know what to expect. I had never played that much golf in a weekend before. I also didn’t know all the guys who were coming on the trip all that well.

Given we just graduated college, we organized this trip on a budget:

• Accommodations: Free! (one guys’ 3 bed house on the Fazio golf course)

• Golf: Discounted rates! (summertime and member discount)

• Food: Cheap (big grocery store run for snacks and food to grill)

• Alcohol: Cheap (drank our own beers on the course each day)

• Transportation: Cheap (One XL SUV for 8 guys. Yes we all fit somehow)

• Flights: Southwest!

The weekend ended up having one funny story to the next.

Loading up a Nissan Armada with 8 23-year-old dudes, 8 sets of golf clubs, and 4 coolers full of beer each morning got a laugh out of the bag drop guys every time we rolled up.

Saturday afternoon a massive thunderstorm rolled through. We just finished our round and were back at the house hanging and playing beer pong. The house was on the 7th hole of the Fazio course. When the rain stopped, there was not a single player on the course for over an hour.

So naturally we decided to grab a bucket of balls, a bunch of 7 irons and start smashing shots at the green in our bathing suits. I’ve never had so much fun on a golf course in my life.

The weekend sadly ended, we declared a winner and all agreed this trip had to become a regular occurrence.

A day later when we got back from Chicago, I got that text from Luis. A guy I somewhat knew but now after this trip felt like a great friend.

Getting that text gave me a sense of joy. Knowing that I planned the trip, helped a bunch of guys get away from the normal day-to-day and they all enjoyed it, made me smile.

But turns out, I didn’t really know at the time just how special that trip was.

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Fast forward to today. I just got back from another edition of the Michigan Ryder Cup.

Covid made us pause for a year. But we have kept the tradition going. The core 6 guys from that first trip are still involved (minus Josh this time, but he will be at the next one!).

It’s been 5 years but the comradery and excitement around this trip every year is still the same.

One thing that has changed is we no longer are on the budget trip, that’s for sure. Not only do these guys like to have fun, but fortunately we’ve done pretty well for ourselves to let us up the experience.

Here’s a quick breakdown from our trip last weekend to Kiawah for comparison:

• Accommodations: 4 bed house on Kiawah Island (on a golf course and a block from the beach)… Not free

• Golf: Most expensive round of golf I’ve ever played (for reference, just the tip for the caddie was $120…@ 20-25%, you do the math)

• Food: combination of groceries and a few meals at the clubhouse…reasonable cost

• Alcohol: Lots of transfusions on the golf course… Not cheap

• Transportation: 2 rental cars and car services to get to/from the airport…Not cheap

• Flights: Let’s just say flying to Charleston from all over the country is not the easiest

From poker nights…

To late night pizza and beer…

From hitting putts with 10 foot alligators breathing down our neck…

To swinging our drivers while listening to the Atlantic Ocean waves crash against the shore…

Even my phone getting run over by a golf cart and crushed into pieces…

This was another memorable trip that we’ll never forget. And when I got back to Austin (after I bought a new phone), I got this text from one of the guys…

“Amazing weekend. Those are the best times. I love that we do this.”

It’s not about the amazing destination or the amount of golf that we play. It’s about a group of guys coming together that now live all across the country for a weekend to bond.

That same core group of guys I was sorta friends with in Chicago back in 2019. It’s crazy to think that 4 out of 5 of them have now asked me to be a groomsman in their weddings (last guy still isn’t engaged, not tryna to imply anything haha).

These trips have helped me stay so close to these guys as we’ve literally all moved across the country.

New York → Boston → DC → Fayetteville → Detroit → Austin

We do a good job staying in touch throughout the year, but nothing beats getting in person.

We all have busy lives and living far away makes it difficult.

But all it takes is getting trips like this on the calendar and committing to it. I’ve led the charge on organizing but what I love about these guys is they are committed as hell.

There are weddings and family obligations. New jobs and work trips that pop up. And sometimes these things have to take priority.

But when the Ryder Cup has been on the calendar for 10 months, there are not many things stopping this group from showing up.

For me, it’s the hugs at the end of the trip saying how awesome a weekend it was. And the texts when I get back home that remind me how important these trips are. And how fortunate I am to have such great friends.

And who knows if we’d all be so close if I hadn’t decided to plan a golf trip in 2019?

Thank you for reading! See below for a few pictures from our trips. As always please reply and let me know what resonated, what didn’t, or what you question. I love chatting about this stuff!

Cheers,

Andrew