“This place was packed,” said Dr. Mary Lou Jones, with Duke Women’s Services of Durham.
Dr. Diana Dell, who happened to be lecturing during the storm, enjoyed a standing-room-only audience. Wasn’t it appropriate that she was giving advice on how to deal with mental disorders and anxiety?
Lots of Loot
Jessica Nurnberg, 9, of Seven Lakes was loving the Women’s Health Festival and the Catch the Spirit tent.
She was busy gathering up samples of sunscreen, Band-Aids, stress balls and anything else she could get her hands on. Sporting a “Catch the Spirit” kids’ cap, which she also got for free, she was jubilant.
“The best part of the tournament is meeting people and all the cool stuff I’m getting for free,” she said, her eyes sparkling. “My dad gave me $10 and I won’t have to spend it. I already have $9 in my bank at home. Now I’ll have 19!”
Busy Meteorologist
The USGA meteorologist was busy on Friday, when a series of thunderstorms passed over Pine Needles.
Jennifer Andrews and Lindsay Spitzor, employees of Pinehurst Championship Management, and Conrad Hayter, a golf landscaper from Pinehurst, were handling the communication detail in the management office.
The Doppler graph being broadcast over the Weather Channel flickered on a laptop computer screen. The three were keeping a vigil over the images, hoping the storms would go around the golf course. Fat chance. By mid-afternoon, the tournament was drowned out.
For Your Dogs
The line is long for a free foot screening in the Women’s Health Festival tent.
Walter and Gwen Cleary own 9th Street Active Feet in Durham, and were on hand to give advice on the types of shoes or inserts spectators needed to walk the five-mile golf course comfortably.
The most common ailment is flat feet.
“Over 80 percent of people in America have flat feet,” Gwen Cleary said. The other 20 percent have arches that are too high.
Based in Durham, the Clearys have a steady clientele provided through various Duke University programs, including the diet center.
“We’ve serviced athletes, actors and all sorts of celebrities,” Cleary said.
She was thrilled when she learned that model Lauren Hutton was scheduled to give a lecture that very morning in the Health Festival tent.
“I spent five or six days with her,” Cleary said. “She’s a wonderful person. I took her to the Museum of Science in Durham and just spent a lot of time with her.”
By the way, Hutton has flat feet.
Proudly Purple
Even though Ashli Bunch’s husband, Mike, beat her the last time they played golf together, he was a proud hubby indeed.
Ashli, in her third year as an LPGA pro, had finally reached the U.S. Women’s Open on her seventh try. Mike was part of Ashli’s immediate and extended family, who traveled together from their home in Morristown, Tenn., to root for their hometown champ.
The group of 20, sporting bright purple T-shirts emblazoned with “Ashli’s Bunch,” were easy to spot in the crowd. Even though Mike was ahead in the family golf standings at the moment, he gave his wife credit for having “too much pride” to play from the up tee and insisting they tee off from the same spot.
They are hometown honeys. “We belonged to the same club,” Mike said. “I had a zero handicap, and she went to college on a scholarship.” The couple were hot competitors from the beginning, and somewhere along the way, sparks were kindled. After five years of dating, they became husband and wife.
Pinehurst Is Best
When asked if he likes to play golf, Barry Ward, editor and publisher of the internet magazine Posh Golf Travel, looked pained.
“Is the Pope Catholic?” he asked before bursting into laughter.
Ward is part of a group of 24 travel writers from Canada, England and Germany who are touring the golf spots in North Carolina this week. They are here through a joint venture between the N.C. Division of Travel and Tourism; the Pinehurst, Sandhills and Aberdeen Area Convention and Visitors Bureau; and the N.C. Golf Marketing Alliance to kindle interest in North Carolina among travelers abroad.
“We like having European golfers here,” said Caleb Miles, executive director of the Convention and Visitors Bureau and current president of the Golf Marketing Alliance. “For one thing, they stay longer and enjoy more of the wonderful things this area has to offer.”
Ward loves it here. A resident of Southport in Lancashire, England, he reckons that he has played at least 3,000 courses. But Pinehurst No. 2 is one of his favorites. He admits to being partial to courses with ocean views and admires several in Scotland. And he loves Kiawah in South Carolina.
Lest local residents and golf marketers feel slighted because there is no ocean view from the Sandhills, Ward did proclaim that “Pinehurst is my very favorite place in the world.”
After a whirlwind tour of North Carolina this week, the writers will head back home.
— Compiled by Teri Saylor
