Grip

Name: Kim HandClub: Pine Ridge Golf CourseAge: 51Born: Burlington, IowaYears a professional: 30Years at present club: 13Career highlights: Head professional at Manor CC prior to going to Pine Ridge. Over the last 13 years, he has developed a Junior program that began as a small number of day camps and now includes some 500 children on a weekly basis during the summer months.Tip: The average person grips the club too tightly. Tension is energy, so you would like the player to grip it just enough to control it. On a scale of 1-10, I would want a grip of about 3-4.Pub Date: 7/09/98

Emery I. Valyi,86, an inventor whose innovations included an easy-to-grip 2-liter plastic soft-drink bottle, died of cancer May 5 in Mount Kisco, N.Y. Pepsi introduced the bottle, known as "The Grip," in March and expects to offer it to a wider market this fall.Pub Date: 5/15/98

Quote: "I knew I was in trouble when they tossed me a ball and I couldn't grip it. If it ain't one thing, it's another. I started to play good and this happened." -- Reds third baseman Pokey Reese, who tore a ligament in his right thumb in diving for a double by Braves' Javy Lopez yesterday.It's a fact: The Cardinals and Braves will wear Negro league replica uniforms Saturday and Sunday in Atlanta.Who's hot: Atlanta's Chipper Jones is batting .410 in July (39-for-95).Who's not: Yesterday's 13-3 loss to the Braves was the Reds' 12th defeat in 14 games.

IT HAS TAKEN a while, but I've become a Howard countian. The transformation didn't happen immediately upon my family's move to the county five years ago. It was a gradual process that sneaked up on me, like my specks of gray hair.I spent my first 28 years living in concrete-covered city neighborhoods and the last 10 adamantly contending that the only place I considered "home" was Philadelphia, specifically North and West Philly.Until now.My first step away from Philadelphia roots came in 1986 when I left Pennsylvania to take a job at a daily paper in Toledo, Ohio.

Regardless of what he's done or what happens from here on, the most consistent thing about Cal Ripken is destined to be overlooked and underappreciated.In any discussion of Ripken's career, defense will always run a distant third to The Streak and his run production in relation to the position he plays. Forgotten will be that he wouldn't have had the opportunity to set those offensive records as a shortstop had it not been for his extraordinary defensive ability.It is one part of Ripken's game that unquestionably has improved with age. And what has made it so spectacular has been its pure simplicity.

Boston.--There was a Catskill comedian who used to tell a story about his first time away from home and home cooking. After a week in Army boot camp his stomach started to feel funny. He was convinced that something was terribly wrong with his digestive system, maybe his entire body.Well, after much medical consultation, the problem was diagnosed. For the first time in his life he wasn't suffering from heartburn.I think about him every summer during the dangerous season of vacations. People, even presidents, get away from the office for a week or two, and if they're not careful, they lose their disequilibrium.

AUGUSTA, Ga. -- The miracle is that Bernhard Langer is still a respectable member of society, that he has not committed some heinous crime or been sent to some padded room or escaped to some remote island to live out his days muttering to himself.The miracle is that he is still a functioning, successful golfer at age 35, a popular figure in his homeland and suddenly in possession of a four-stroke lead after three rounds of the 57th Masters. That's more than just miraculous. That's goofy.Sixteen years ago, Langer was struck by terrible misfortune.

A Westminster woman who robbed a convenience store the fled without money after she changed her mind about it will spend two years in jail for attempted armed robbery.Kendra Lee Dorsey, 25, of the first block of Washington Road, was sentenced yesterday to five years in state prison, but Circuit Judge Francis M. Arnold suspended three years of the term.Dorsey was arrested shortly after Mary Pollard, an employee of the High's store in the 200 block of E. Green St., told a Westminster policeman that she had been forced at gunpoint to give a woman money from the dairy store's cash register April 6.Ms.

Strongput Inc., the Owings Mills maker of much-publicized exercise weights, said yesterday it is involved in an intricate $100 million deal that will pump some $12 million into the small firm and may catapult its chief executive officer to the top of a British corporation that controls half-a-dozen other specialty companies.E. David Gable, Strongput's president, said yesterday that negotiations for the deal are "essentially completed," though he has not yet decided whether to accept an offer that would also make him the head of the British firm Turbo City Corp.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- For the past 12 months, the boosters in this city of glass towers and blue-suited bankers appeared to be on the verge of their greatest victory: Pro football, in all its network glory, was as good as here.All the pieces were in place. Rich investors. Powerful bankers. Twenty-five acres of downtown were cleared, a jail and a nursing home moved, and 110,000 cubic yards of dirt piled into the oval shape of a stadium.But, like a wobbly touchdown pass, football might be slipping from Charlotte's grip -- and into the reach of Baltimore.

No matter how well it's going, the Blast just can't escape the grip of the Detroit Ignition. In a game of furious offensive tempo, the Ignition ended the Blast's regular season on a sour note last night in a 22-21 thriller before an announced 6,713 at 1st Mariner Arena. Ironmen@Blast MISL quarterfinals, Game 1, Thursday, 7:05 p.m. 680 AM

Beethoven's grip on the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra tightened this week, and its grip on Beethoven tightened as well. The BSO performs at 8 tonight and 3 p.m. tomorrow at the Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, 1212 Cathedral St. Tickets are $40-$60. Call 410-783-8000 or go to bsomusic.org.

DEAR CAL -- Do batting gloves have any real use other than as a fashion accessory? Now that metal bats have grips already on them to help hold onto the bat and soak up some of the shock, it doesn't seem like the gloves are necessary. Plus, they're expensive! Don Marti, Triadelphia, W.Va. DEAR DON -- It is true that aluminum bats have grips, and I would imagine that a connection could be made between an aluminum bat grip and a tennis grip. You don't see too many tennis players using batting gloves.

As they put up houses for sale, some Baltimore entrepreneurs are reviving an old practice to make new profits. Rehabbers and ground rent holders are creating new rents on the land under those houses, saddling buyers with annual fees of as much as $240. In some cases they tack a new ground rent on top of an existing one, which can increase a homeowner's yearly bill to more than $300. Dr. Michael Moriarty nearly walked away from buying a $500,000 home in Federal Hill last year when he found out that the seller had created a $120 yearly rent for the land under the house.

The difference between good Erik Bedard and bad Erik Bedard is clear. The one who looks like an ace throws three pitches for strikes. The one who doesn't struggles to control anything but his fastball. Good Bedard has re-emerged in his three most recent starts using a new changeup grip he learned from teammate Kris Benson. It's a circle change passed down from off-speed master Tom Glavine. Bedard hopes the new grip will give him enduring confidence in a pitch that has often betrayed him. "I just haven't found a grip I am comfortable with or consistent with," he said.

Hometown -- Elkridge Current members --Shelly Blake, piano and guitar Founded in --1995 Style --indie folk/improv Influenced by --his kids and Leonard Cohen Notable --Starting at 11:15 p.m. tomorrow, Blake and bassist Joel Grip kick off a 48-hour nonstop music spree. After a kick-off party at Blake's house, he, Grip, a filmmaker and two drivers will hop in a van and head for Philly, where they'll perform a handful of shows. Then it's back to Baltimore, down to Washington and back to Baltimore for a benefit show at An die Musik.

FORT WORTH, Texas -- There are three compelling reasons why Jim Furyk has not written a golf instruction book for amateurs - his grip, his swing and his putting approach. All are unconventional. But they work for Furyk, who heads into the Bank of America Colonial as the top-ranked player in the field in season earnings ($2,962,649), scoring average (69.46) and world ranking (fifth). "I wouldn't tell people to try to copy what I do," said Furyk, who overlaps two fingers on his grip, has a loop at the top of his swing and putts cross-handed.

Starting Sunday, St. John's College will display more than 50 works from Ben-Zion Weinman in an exhibit titled Ben-Zion: In the Grip of the Five Senses. The works are predominantly iron sculptures depicting common items such as shovels, nails and rocks. Other mediums include paintings, prints, drawings and poetry. His "Glory of War" is pictured. Ben-Zion: In the Grip of the Five Senses opens Sunday and runs through Dec. 15 at the Mitchell Gallery at St. John's College, 60 College Ave. in Annapolis.

Harriet B. Braiker, 55, a psychologist and expert on stress management, died of respiratory failure Saturday in Pasadena, Calif. Her many books included The Type E Woman: How to Overcome the Stress of Being Everything to Everybody in 1986, and, after the terrorist attacks, The September 11 Syndrome: Seven Steps to Getting a Grip in Uncertain Times.

The numbers are in: On three typical holes in the final round of the U.S. Open last Sunday, Sergio Garcia averaged 33 seconds before his tee shot and 23 pre-swing waggles. Those numbers come courtesy of Richard Sandomir of The New York Times, who notes that, by comparison, in his famous Honeymooners golfing lesson for buddy Ralph Kramden, Ed Norton committed nine waggles during a 15-second swing preamble. Unlike Norton, Garcia didn't address the ball with a hearty, "Hello, ball!" Others, however, weren't shy about addressing Garcia's waggles, which can be defined as repeated loosenings and regrippings of the golf club.