The tournament

Thursday: 3-8 6 hours
Friday: 8:00am-9pm 13 hours
Saturday: 6:00am-9:00pm 15 hours
Sunday: 6:00 am-9:00 pm 15 hours
Monday: 6:00 am-5pm 11 hours

Total hours: 60 hours

Thursday:

I began this day by waking up at 3 am to make it to the airport in time for my six o'clock flight. I arrived in West Palm Beach around 11:30. I was traveling with a gentleman named Dave Sheets, and his son Marty, who is a special Olympics athlete. Marty is 54 years old, and he competed in the first Special Olympics Event at Soldier Field in 1968. Other than golf, he also participates in power lifting, and a couple of other sports. Anyway, after we arrived at the airport, we rented a car, and left for Port St. Lucie. By the time we got to Port St. Lucie, it was around 1:30 in the afternoon. We got something to eat at the cafe, went to our Condos and dropped our stuff off, and then came back to "headquarters" to begin working. I worked with putting the last bit of information into the tournament handbook, in addition to adding medical forms to the notebook. Also, I had to make some last second phone calls for people who had not brought their medical forms with them, and get them faxed to the PGA golf club. We did not receive the fax until Friday though. Also, we were putting together athlete goodie bags, and finishing up some of the last-minute details for the tournament. After this, the workers all went out to dinner for one last "real" meal before the tournament began.

Friday:
I worked athlete check-in/family registration. As various delegations came in, they came to me to receive all of their credentials, and I took note of any changes to their delegation, whether in job description, or if athletes did not come. I made changes to any credential information that needed to be made. I also checked all of their medical forms, to make sure I had them. There were a couple I did not, but fortunately most of them brought copies of the forms just in case. There was a situation that we had to work out in which we did not have an athletes medical info, and his mother did not have a copy, but we were able to work it out. At check in, they also received their athlete/partner gift bags, and proceeded to receive their room keys. Registration took a lot longer because there was an accident on I-95, which caused delays from the airport. Opening ceremonies were also this evening, but I was unable to go, because of registration running late. The opening dinner was Friday evening as well, and was followed by a coach's meeting, where the coaches received all the information on tee times for the first day of the tournament, and we went through all the tournament rules and answered any questions that the coach's had.

Saturday:
I worked athlete/ partner check-in and handed out caddie bibs. This involved confirming athlete tee-times and making sure they arrived on time at their tees. I also had to track down any athletes who may have been late and send them the right direction. Saturday evening I delivered dinner to the athletes. This was a huge problem because the caterer we ordered from was not very efficient. He did not bring all of the food at once, he had to make three trips to get get all of the food. He seemed to think that he was supposed to drop the food off in one place and everyone would come to get it, but did not understand that he still would have been late if he didn't have all the food at once. He was also more concerned with an event that he booked at the same time as ours. Needless to say, it was a disaster and it took me two hours longer than it was supposed to to deliver the food.

Sunday:
I worked athlete/partner check-in again. I had to inform some athletes of changes in their tee times, but other than that it ran smoothly. That afternoon I ran the Pitch and Putt competition on the short course at the PGA golf. I had to organize the groups into a line, and send them through the course. There were pros from the clubhouse throughout the course helping the athletes through the course. At the wrap-up banquet I announced the winners of the competition, and there was a slide show of pictures throughout the week.

Monday:
I worked athlete/partner check-in again. This time I had to track down athletes to inform that their tee-times had been changed because they hadn't been warned of it ahead of time as they had been the day before. The award ceremonies began at 9:30 as the athletes began finishing their round. They came through in shifts as each of their divisions finished. I worked the merchandise tent after registration; we sold Polo's, hats, visors, etc.