2019 Golf Oklahoma October|November

Official publication of the Oklahoma Golf Association

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TABLE OF CONTENTS OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2019

Volume 9 Issue 5

The Goods 14 16

Was Young Tom the greatest of all time?

Slow Play, we all hate it, why are we powerless to stop it?

18 Chip Shots Team Tulsa in PGA Jr. League Finals, Chance Cozby is top Thunderbird, news and notes from around the state.

41 35

26 Features 12

Rules gurus Gene Mortensen and David Thompson bring different perspectives, same love for game

30

Bo Van Pelt sacrificed a rib to recover his health and return to the PGA Tour

35

Bill Glasson earned his berth in Oklahoma Golf Hall of Fame through grit and determination to be the best

40 30

18

Oklahoma Course News 26

Oklahoma City Golf and Country Club’s massive renovation is nearly complete.

28

Canyons at Blackjack Ridge about to build new clubhouse, install Bermuda greens.

Destinations 41

Boyne served as catalyst for Northern Michigan golf explosion

Departments 6 8 8 9

Letter from the Publisher OGA ED Mark Felder WOGA ED Susan Ferguson

44 45 46

Fitness: Clint Howard Instruction: Ryan Rody Schedules and results

Rules, Gene Mortensen

On the cover We’re all tired of slow play on the PGA Tour and at our local course. Illustration by Chris Swafford

Support junior golf by contributing to the OGA Foundation Call 405-848-0042 for more information 4

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GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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OCT/NOV 2019

FROM THE PUBLISHER KEN M AC LEOD

Shout outs to Oklahoma standouts in 2019 Oak Tree Gang Rides Again We’re glad to see all the young professionals on both the PGA Tour and Korn Ferry Tour who are playing out of Oak Tree National in Edmond on at least a part-time basis.

During my last trip there, I saw a group go by that included Matthew Wolff, and Viktor Hovland, while working diligently on the range was Michael Gellerman. All will be essentially rookies in 2019-20, though Wolff earned his card last summer with his first victory.

Other PGA Tour members who frequent Oak Tree include Talor Gooch and Rhein Gibson. Kevin Tway of course grew up there, though now he has homes in Scottsdale, Ariz., and Jupiter, Fla. Among those trying to work their way up to PGA Tour status who call Oak Tree National home at least part of the year include Charlie Saxon, Josh Creel, Taylor Moore, Zach Bauchou, Will Kropp, Blake Trimble, Hayden Wood and Rupert Kaminski.

The only two members of the original Oak Tree Gang still actively competing on the Champions Tour are Willie Wood and Scott Verplank. The group also included at various times Bob Tway, Gil Morgan, David Edwards, Danny Edwards, Doug Tewell, Jim Woodward and Andy Dillard.

It’s highly unusual for any club outside of Florida, Texas or Arizona to be the home for more than one or two professionals, but the situation at Oak Tree National is truly unique and much credit goes to Oak Tree COO and President Tom Jones for restoring the club’s welcoming and nurturing of young professionals.

OJGT going strong The level of play of junior golf in Oklahoma remains exceedingly strong. Look at the Oklahoma Junior Golf Tour results any week and you’ll see players committed to Oklahoma (Andrew Goodman and Jaxon Dowell), Oklahoma State (Jordan Wilson), Texas Tech (James Roller) and Baylor (Luke Morgan) in heated battle. And they get beat as often as they win by others out to earn prestigious scholarships of their own.

There are a large number of talented girls coming up as well. Check golfoklahoma. org after the signing date this fall and you’ll see a whole new batch of OJGT players off to college.

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One outstanding junior who did not go to college is Yujeong Son of Norman, who won the Women’s State Amateur from 2013-16, never losing a match. Son has spent the summer competing on the Symetra Tour, the proving ground for LPGA competitors.

The top-10 finishers earn LPGA Tour cards and Son, now just 18, played 21 straight events in order to earn a shot at a card before dropping out, exhausted, after a first-round 80 in late September in Prattville, Ala. She was back the last week of September and in the Symetra Tour Championship the first week of October trying to climb into that top 10. If not, she will go to LPGA Qualifying School. Son ranked 16th on the money list going into the final two weeks with five top-10 finishes and one runner-up spot.

A few more kudos The story on longtime OGA rules officials Gene Mortensen and David Thompson in this issue makes Gene sound a bit gruff, but he’s always been a sweetheart to me. I want to thank him so much for all the informative columns he’s written on the rules for this magazine and our readers, and for not penalizing me for all the things I probably did wrong the times he drove by during Tulsa Golf Association events.

Gene was part of a wonderful crew of dedicated volunteers put together by former OGA Executive Director Bill Barrett. Others included Roy Oxford, Corky Billen and Verne Force. They did so much to promote golf in this state with limited resources and deserve the eternal gratitude of every golfer in Oklahoma. Yes, even if Gene gave you a penalty.

Congrats to Chance Cozby for taking the prestigious position of executive director of The Thunderbirds, the charity organization that runs the Waste Management Phoenix Open, the most well-attended and unique event on the PGA Tour. It also raised and distributed over $13 million to charity last year and Cozby told us there’s no better feeling than writing and distributing checks to organizations in need.

And finally, best of luck to Bo Van Pelt, who is making his return to the PGA Tour minus his top rib which was surgically removed to help alleviate thoracic outlet syndrome. Bo has been a great addition to the Tulsa sports radio scene with his guest spots on The Sports Animal, but is now back doing what he loves best.

Volume 9, Number 5 Golf Oklahoma Offices Southern Hills Plaza 6218 S. Lewis Ave., Ste. 102 Tulsa, OK 74136 918-280-0787 Oklahoma City Office 405-640-9996

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FACEBOOK.COM/ GOLFOKLAHOMAMAGAZINE

Publisher Ken MacLeod ken@golfoklahoma.org

FOLLOW US! @GOLFOKMAGAZINE

COO/Marketing Director A.G. Meyers agm@golfoklahoma.org Art & Technology Director Chris Swafford chris@golfoklahoma.org Subscriptions to Golf Oklahoma are $15 for one year (five issues) or $25 for two years (10 issues). Call 918-280-0787 or go to www.golfoklahoma.org.

Contributing photographers Rip Stell, Bill Powell Golf Oklahoma PGA Instructional Staff Jim Woodward Teaching Professional, Oak Tree National jwoodwardgolf@sbcglobal.net, 405-348-2004 Jim Young Teaching Professional, River Oaks CC 405-630-8183 Tracy Phillips Director of Instruction, FlyingTee vt4u@yahoo.com, 918-352-1089 Maggie Roller Director of Instruction, Cedar Ridge CC maggie.roller@sbcglobal.net, 918-261-1441 Jerry Cozby PGA Professional jerrycozby@aol.com, 918-914-1784 Kyley Tetley, PGA Professional The Golf Studio 918-232-6564 Oklahoma Golf Association 2800 Coltrane Place, Suite 2 Edmond, OK 73034 405-848-0042 Executive Director Mark Felder mfelder@okgolf.org Director of Handicapping and Course Rating Jay Doudican jdoudican@okgolf.org Director of Junior Golf Morri Rose morose@okgolf.org Copyright 2019 by Golf Oklahoma Magazine. All rights reserved. Contents may not be reprinted or otherwise reproduced without written permission from Golf Oklahoma. Golf Oklahoma is published by South Central Golf, Inc.

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MARK FELDER

OGA Executive Director

FROM THE OGA EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

State Amateur returning to The Patriot The Stroke Play Championship moves World Golf Handicap System goes into Patriot Golf Club in Owasso will be the site of the 2020 to The Territory near Duncan on June 22- effect Jan. 1 of 2020, replacing GHIN and Oklahoma State Amateur Championship, 24, another fantastic venue. The complete other handicap systems so all the world’s golfers are receiving their handicaps the hosting our top event for the second time schedule is below.

Also, our schedule of qualifiers for same way. All clubs using GHIN should in three years. be using the new Oklahoma City in 2020.

Golf & Country 2020 OGA SCHEDULE Visit www.okgolf.org for more information system Golfers should Club was origiDates Tournament Site Deadline see little if any nally slated for change in their 2020, but is comMay 18-19 Spring Four-Ball Championship The Golf Club of Oklahoma May 11 current handiing off a full- scale May 18-19 Senior Spring Four-Ball Championship The Golf Club of Oklahoma May 11 caps. restoration by arThe Oklahoma chitect Tripp DaJune 1-4 Junior Boys and Girls Championship Kickingbird Golf Club May 25 Junior Golf Tour vis. The 2018 final June 16-19 Sr. State Amateur Championship Belmar Golf Club June 9 is rocking along at The Patriot feaJune 22-24 Stroke Play Championship The Territory June 15 this fall headtured Oklahoma July 6 State Amateur qualifier Lincoln Park GC - West June 29 ing toward the State teammates season-ending Hayden Wood July 9 State Amateur qualifier Bailey Ranch Golf Club June 29 Red River Shootand Austin EckJuly 21-23 State Amateur Championship The Patriot June 29 out on Oct. 19roat squaring off Aug. 3-4 Mid-Amateur Championship Quail Creek G&CC July 27 20 at Dornick and we’re hoping Hills Country for an equally exAug. 3-4 Senior Stroke Play Championship Quail Creek G&CC July 27 Club in Ardmore. citing conclusion Aug. 20 Oklahoma Open Qualifier Oak Tree CC - West Course Aug. 13 I’m constantly next year.

Aug. 27-29 Oklahoma Open Championship Oak Tree CC - East Course Aug. 21 amazed by the Also new for ast ronom ica l ly 2020, the MidAmateur Championship and the Senior USGA championships is currently be- low numbers our juniors are shooting in Stroke Play Championship will be held ing set. Any clubs interested in hosting a these events which help prepare them so simultaneously. Both events will be at USGA qualifier should contact the OGA at well for their high school seasons in the spring and for college and beyond in the Quail Creek Golf and Country Club in 405-848-0042.

Golfers should be aware that the new future.

Oklahoma City on Aug. 3-4.

SUSAN FERGUSON

President WOGA

WOMEN’S OKLAHOMA GOLF ASSOCIATION

Golf Club of Oklahoma on tap in 2020 WOGA is pleased to announce the 2020 Women’s State Amateur Championship is slated July 20-23 in Broken Arrow at The Golf Club of Oklahoma, the wonderful Tom Fazio layout that has recently undergone many improvements under owner Elby Beal, general manager Tim Johnson and head professional Greg Bray.

This year’s event was held at Oak Tree Country Club, with Sydney Youngblood edging ShaeBug Scarberry in an exciting and well-played match.

Also, the 70th Junior Girls State Championship is scheduled July 14-15 at Cedar Ridge Country Club, also in Broken Arrow. It will be preceded on July 13 by the crucial fundraising tournament.

Other dates: The Stableford Tournament will be April 27-28 at Lincoln Park West in Oklahoma City. The Senior Women’s Amateur is May 18-19 at Tulsa Coun8

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try Club. And the Partnership Tournament is Aug. 17-18 at Shangri-La Resort Golf Course near Afton. Sites and dates for the Stroke Play/MidAmateur Championship and the WOGA Team Cup have not been determined.

Applications close Oct. 18 for high schools and junior golf programs who would like to apply for WOGA’s grant program. Recipients will be announced on Nov. 15.

Go to www.woga.us to apply or for more inforSydney Youngblood mation.

These grants are crucial for the ability lowship. We look of many high school programs to be able you in 2020.

to support a golf team.

If you would like to help in this mission by making a financial contribution to our Scholarship Fund and Grants Program, you can do so on the website or by mailing a check to WOGA, 6218 S. Lewis Ave., Suite 102, Tulsa, OK 74136.

WOGA is a 501 c(3) charitable organization and all donations are tax deductible.

Thanks to all of our contestants and supporters for a great year of competition and felforward to seeing all of

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

GENE MORTENSEN

OGA Rules Director

OKLAHOMA GOLF ASSOCIATION NEWS

How to tell if ball is truly in a bunker In this final article of the sea- places clubs in the bunker; leans on a club often results in temporary water in a bunto rest or stay balanced; or strikes the sand ker. The player is entitled to free relief from son we will discuss Bunkers and Rule 12. the water, however the reference With the revision there were point and relief area must be in some changes which we need that same bunker. If there is no to adopt for scoring purposes. nearest point of “complete” relief, Bunkers are the creation of the the player will take the maximum course designer and they can be available relief. This means that if of all shapes and sizes. A bunker there are 6 inches of water in one consists of a prepared area on the place the player may drop the ball course from which sod has been where the water measures 1 inch. replaced with sand or the like.

In this situation, if the player elects A ball is in the bunker when it to go out of the bunker, there is a touches the sand on the ground penalty of one stroke and the relief inside the edge of the bunker. If a is on the line formed by the flagball lies on soil or grass inside the stick and where the ball lies, going edge of the bunker, without touching any sand, the ball is not in the The diagram provides examples of when a ball is in straight back.

When you have questions about bunker. Sand that has spilled over and not in a bunker. the Rules, contact the OGA. the edge is not part of the bunker.

The fact that the ball is in a bunker is im- in anger or frustration.

When a player determines that the ball is portant for relief purposes.

Sign up for our enewsletter The player incurs the General Penalty by unplayable in a bunker, the reference point at golfoklahoma.org deliberately touching sand with a hand or and relief area must be in that same bunker. for the chance to win tickets, club to test the condition or learn informa- If the third option for an unplayable ball is rounds and other prizes tion for the next stroke. There is no pen- used, the player returns to the spot where as well as keep up with alty if the player digs in to take a stance; the last stroke was made. all the breaking news In Oklahoma we have storms and this smooths the sand to care for the course;

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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9

DAVID THOMPSON

USGA Regional Affairs Committee

presented by

Knee drop proved no big deal

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s it pertains to the USGA, 2019 was a year in which several changes took place.

Most visible was the implementation of the modernization of the “Rules of Golf.”

The R&A along with the USGA took several years to come to agreement on these changes. While there were some hiccups, most notably in the professional ranks, players have now seemed to settle in with the changes after finally figuring out that a simple bend at the waist will allow you to reach your knee to achieve a proper drop height.

Included in the rules changes were changes in terminology. For example, “through the green” has been replaced with the “General Area.” The driving force behind some of these changes is to help the golfer have a better understanding of the rules. As an example, instead of a hole being halved or the match being all square, the term “tied” is now used in both instances. I don’t recall any other sport that uses all square. It would be unusual to have the TV announcer say that the football teams were all square after the first quarter.

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Also, some of these terminology changes were driven by language barriers. Since these new rules are being used worldwide, there were some terms in the previous rules that simply did not translate in other languages. The goal that I believe was achieved was to make the rules more understandable in words that we normally use.

Another less noticeable change has placed the responsibility for all USGA qualifiers with the local Allied Golf Association (AGA), which in Oklahoma is the Oklahoma Golf Association (OGA). USGA Committee members were responsible previously for those qualifiers. While those committee members will continue to assist the OGA with qualifiers, their role has shifted to assistance as a rules referee.

This is my 10th year on the USGA Re-

gional Affairs Committee and this role has provided me opportunities to represent the USGA both locally along with numerous national championships.

That has allowed me to travel to places that I would not likely have visited. I have thoroughly enjoyed volunteering as I have told people many times. If I didn’t enjoy what I was doing, why would I spend my money doing it? Having said that, I notified the USGA last year that 10 years was enough and 2019 would be my last year as a committee member.

I want to thank Ken for allowing me to pen these columns and thanks to those people who have told me that they had read the column. Every so often, someone even told me that they enjoyed what I had written.

Hopefully, the columns, if not enjoyable, were informative.

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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SHOTS

Gene Mortensen

David Thompson

Rulers of the course

by God when we came around, everybody knew they better play by the rules.”

Mortensen once had a water bottle come whizzing past his ear, courtesy of the father of a young player he reprimanded after a filiated with the USGA. by ken macleod “I had more time to school David than temper tantrum at Karsten Creek in Stillf Gene Mortensen and David Thomp- I did Gene,” laughs Felder. “I brought him water. He had black stares cast his way son had a devil and an angel whis- over to the PGA attitude, which is night and some players were so nervous when pering in their ears when about to and day from the USGA. When the PGA he was around they could hardly swing.

His own son, Joel, made him make a ruling on the golf stand behind a tree when he course, there was little doubt was watching him play. He to whom each was inclined to “Both have been very important to disqualified Jason Dufner listen. the OGA and instrumental in getting us from a tournament, showing Mortensen was from the he was equally stern with the old USGA school of P.J. Boatto where we are now.” famous and obscure. wright with Jim Unruh of Tul- Mark Felder, OGA Executive Director “There was a guy who sa his local mentor. Men who played in our events from believed a rule is a rule and Ponca City and if he knew not made to be broken and gleefully compared the penalties handed does a tournament, most of the competi- Gene was around, he would just say come out at the day’s end like big-game hunters tors are either members or future custom- on and give me the penalty,” Felder said. ers. Gene was already well into his time “He literally couldn’t hit a shot if he knew on safari checking their trophies.

Like Mortensen, Thompson has spent with the OGA when I came in, but he did Gene was watching.”

Mortensen started with the OGA unyears volunteering to do rules for various soften up quite a bit at the end.”

“I don’t think David likes to apply pen- der Bill Barrett’s team in 1993 after retirUSGA events, but unlike Mortensen, he has earned a reputation as a rules official alties,” said Mortensen, now 77 and bat- ing from a distinguished career in law. who would rather help a golfer avoid a pen- tling health issues. “I never minded it. I’m He was originally from North Dakota, alty and hands one out only as a last resort. of the old school. As P.J. Boatwright said, attended undergraduate school at MinneHis attitude is more reflective of the if there’s a rule and players don’t obey it, sota State and law school at the University PGA of America rules official than the it’s a penalty, no questions asked. These of Tulsa from 1965 to 1968, graduating on USGA, perhaps because his boss Mark days under some of the rules, you have to the night Elvin Hayes led Houston to its Felder, the executive director of the Okla- intend to break the rule for it to be a pen- monumental upset of UCLA. At TU, he served as editor of the Tulsa Law Journal, homa Golf Association, is a longtime PGA alty. That was never the case.

“We were considered stern rulers, but the highest honor a law school bestows on professional running an organization af-

Different approaches, one shared love of golf for long-time top OGA rules officials

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GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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its students.

Mortensen brought his Tulsa Country Club friend Thompson into the OGA in 2006 as Thompson was retiring from a successful career that spanned many Tulsa businesses, among them WilTel Communications. Both have dedicated countless days and weeks to the organization not only in working tournaments but in serving on the OGA board, as president and helping the organization through critical stress points at various times.

Despite their difference in personality and approach, both have a heart of gold, a love for golf and a deep well of selfless giving that has been of immeasurable benefit to both the OGA and the USGA. Both have risen in the ranks to where they were in high demand to work USGA events around the nation.

And one thing they both agree on is enforcing pace of play. While the PGA Tour and major USGA and collegiate events continue to wrestle with slow golf, there is seldom a pace of play issue at an OGA event. The system is founded on allowing no more than 15 minutes per hole for a max of a 4.5-hour round.

“There is nothing more dreaded than slow play,” Mortensen said. “And seemingly no one interested in solving the issue except the OGA. We have this policy of 2 hours and 15 minutes per side, stay with the group in front of you and you won’t have a problem. If you finish 18 minutes behind the group in front of you, everybody gets a penalty shot. It’s very simple, they understand it and they go play.”

For this writer, seeing Mortensen at an event was a comfort, knowing deadlines would likely be met. For the players, it was not always the same. Mortensen would chastise those he felt were taking undue time, leading to several less than pleasant exchanges.

“Gene is actually one of the nicest, funniest guys in the whole world,” Felder said.

“He’s been my father figure on the board ever since I got here. He helped the OGA out of a serious IRS problem back in the day and he put us on his back and got us on the other side to where we could start running the OGA as a business. What he’s done for the organization has been way above and beyond the call of duty. He’s my hero and not having him on the board now makes me sad.

“When David was president, we went through some real turmoil as well and he got us through that. He helped us elevate GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

tournament operations and the way we ran events. Both have been very important to the OGA and instrumental in getting us to where we are now.”

The mild-mannered but firm Thompson was an avid amateur with what he thought was a good grasp of the rules until Mortensen recruited him. His first threeday rules workshop was in 2007 and the final day is spent taking a test in which the minimum score to be recommended to work USGA events is a 92. Thompson scored a 63.

“I came out thinking I had done pretty well,” Thompson said. “I learned you have to read the entire question and not be thinking, ‘I know this one.’ “ He began working OGA events and by 2011 had scored well enough to start working USGA events, beginning with the U.S. Women’s Amateur and the U.S. Senior Open that first year. Since 2013 he has worked more than 40 USGA championships and typically logs more than 77 days a year on the road working tournaments, all of it on a volunteer basis.

Both Thompson and Mortensen have had plenty of unusual circumstances pop

up in the hundreds of events they’ve officiated. Thompson recalls working a women’s collegiate event at The Blessings in Fayetteville where two drives came to rest with the balls touching in a fairway divot.

One player marked her ball and the other hit, exploding the divot much deeper than before. The second player was crestfallen until Thompson told her she was allowed to rebuild the lie she had originally.

“Oh, cool!” was the response.

“That’s kind of an example of how the rules are there to help you,” Thompson said.

Whether a rules official is there to help you to avoid a penalty in the short term or learn a hard lesson in the long run, there’s no disputing this ruling: Both Thompson and Mortensen have been and continue to be a blessing for the OGA.

Sign up for our enewsletter at golfoklahoma.org for the chance to win tickets, rounds and other prizes as well as keep up with all the breaking news

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13

The OCT/NOV

Some things we like to do before and after the round

GOODS

The Bookshelf

Giving young Tom his due by tom bedell

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t least on social media these days most GOAT discussion s — who’s the Greatest of All Time?--assume it’s a two-man race in the world of golf between Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods.

Dissenting opinionators soberly submit the names of Ben Hogan or Bobby Jones, not without some reason. An oddball Canadian might shout out the name of Moe Norman.

Stephen Proctor, a former newspaper editor, goes back even further in his brief, “Monarch of the Green: Young Tom Morris, Pioneer of Modern Golf” (Arena Sport, $28.95). He makes a pretty sound case that Young Tom may have been the best of them all, though his career was all too brief with his shocking death on Christmas morning, 1875, at age 24.

Tom Morris Sr. and Tom Morris Jr. had eight Open Championships between the two of them.

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The story of the two Morris men, Young and Old Tom, is not exactly shrouded in dusty history. And, indeed, anyone who has visited St. Andrews and wandered over to the cemetery on the grounds of the St. Andrews Cathedral ruins cannot help but be struck by the memorial there to Tommy, erected through contributions from sixty golfing societies of the day.

Such was the impact he had.

The memorial struck Proctor, too, with the idée fixe of restoring the luster to Tommy’s career achievements and move his life beyond mere melodrama—the young golfer who supposedly died of a broken heart because of the death of his new-born son and his wife, during that birth.

Proctor relates the prodigal amount of research he did for the project; his bibliography runs for eight pages. Curiously, he never cites “Tommy’s Honour” by Kevin Cook, a book which won the USGA’s Herbert Warren Wind Book Award in 2007 and was subsequently made into a film of the same name in 2016 (reviewed here in the April-May 2017 issue).

Well, maybe he does. In an afterward about the writing of the book Proctor notes that, “I have studiously avoided the temptation to create scenes, describing only those that could be reconstructed based on news reports or memoirs written by a person who lived in Tommy’s age and saw him play. The same is true of quotes attributed to characters in this book. All of them were recorded by a contemporary of the person speaking.”

Cook’s book, which naturally covers much of the same ground, doesn’t follow the same rules. Despite the book’s acclaim, I never made it past a prologue which is clearly fiction. Such a writerly transgression in a work of purported nonfiction seemed to bother no one but purists, but I guess I am one, in that regard at least. One I might even forgive if the author at least acknowledged taking a few liberties. This Cook never does.

The downside of Proctor’s admirable rigor is that the prose does lack some narrative zest.

The accumulating accounts of Tommy’s many victories and the running campaign to posit that he in fact changed the face of golf for subsequent generations becomes a little dry.

The case is nonetheless made because there’s plenty to go on, beginning with the 16-yearold Tommy’s first victory in a professional tournament at Carnoustie in 1867. The following year, then 17, he became (and remains) the youngest player to win a major tournament, the Open Championship.

He won the next two, too, and his three straight victories gave him the right to keep the Challenge Belt that previous victors had retained for only one year. (It is now in the R&A Clubhouse.) There was no tournament in 1871, but the first name inscribed in 1872 on the new trophy, the Claret Jug, was again Young Tom’s. He remains the only player in history to win the same major championship in four consecutive tilts.

Proctor does a fine job of situating golf into the context of the times, and charting how the game was changing in the years that Young Tom played—often changing because of him. Old Tom was ever mindful and deferential to the class distinctions separating gentlemen from the working GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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class, and being a professional golfer (if still a relatively new notion) did not place one in the former category.

But Young Tom was a bright, welleducated lad who cared little for social boundaries, and he could get away with it because he was usually making money for the gentry in high-stakes challenge matches, often teamed with his father. When these matches pitted teams from different towns they generated wild interest on the ground and in the press and can rightly be credited with growing the game.

Young Tom brought a like-minded headstrong quality to the links. If the style of play in the feathery days was a cautious, point-to-point plod, Tommy came of age as the gutta-percha ball took over, and he used it in a go-for-broke style. But his real skill, Proctor notes, came on the greens, where he often turned away before the putt even dropped and told his caddies, “Pick it out of the hole, laddie.”

(Old Tom had less luck with his putter.

One wag from the R&A addressed a letter to “Misser of Short Putts” and it was promptly delivered to Old Tom’s door.)

Of recorded events Proctor was able to unearth, he posits that Young Tom played in at least 89 significant events, winning 54 of them, for an astonishing winning percentage of 60. (Tiger’s is currently about 23%, Nicklaus about 15%. Jones comes in at 44%, Hogan at 23%. I can’ seem to find any percentages for Nelson or Snead, but safe to assume they’re right up there, too.

It does raise the question why that stat isn’t more prevalent?)

Tommy’s death did indeed come less than four months after his wife and son died, and he was no doubt despondent.

And though he did refrain from the 1875 Open Championship, held shortly after the dual funeral, he was soon out playing golf again. This included a marathon match against amateur Arthur Molesworth of 216 holes, much of it played in snowy weather. (Despite giving Arthur six strokes a round, 72 in all, Tommy won easily, 11 and 10.)

Young Tom died in his sleep, most likely of a ruptured aneurysm in one of his main arteries, resulting in fatal bleeding into his chest cavity. Others would say he died of a broken heart. Old Tom never put any credence to that. As he would often say, “If that was true, I wouldn’t be here either.”

Old Tom Bedell recalls removing his cap when he visited the Tommy memorial in St. Andrews.

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

La Aurora 115th anniversary by mike crabtree & laramie navrath

La Aurora was founded in 1903 by Eduardo Leon Jimenes in the small community of Don Pedro, Guazumal, a suburb of Santiago de los Caballeros, Dominican Republic.

The dream, creating a handmade cigar brand with global dimensions. The first cigars produced were of “the Perfecto” format, a doble figurado that even today are rolled in a very limited way. La Aurora’s stamp on the Dominican Republic is seen throughout the years. They were the first company to put identifying bands on cigars, create the people’s work union, expand tobacco exports & crop production and dominate the country’s beer market.

With 115 years of history, La Aurora is a modern cigar factory with more than 1100 workers, that produce more than 1 billion sticks per year and has presence in 67 markets in the world today. As the oldest and most internationally renowned ci-

gar factory in the Dominican Republic, La Aurora still maintains the values of quality, dedication, and effort that has characterized the company since its founding.

In commemoration of the date, La Aurora introduced a new cigar, the La Aurora 115th Anniversary. The La Aurora 115th Edition comes in a variety of sizes and is medium to full in flavor and strength. This cigar is the culmination of a meticulous selection process that pays to their centennial values of quality and perfection.

The Ecuadorian wrapper is oily and salty. The cigar’s Brazilian binder offers the spicy notes of cinnamon and black pepper.

Rounding out rich notes of sweet cedar and nuts through the use of Dominican, Nicaraguan and Brazilian fillers that are evident throughout the smoke. ZT Cigars is honored to carry the La Aurora 115th Anniversary cigars and hope you get the chance to enjoy the cigar as much as the history.

Proudly serving Oklahoma with a fine selection of cigars and related products.

Stop on by our current locations and share a smoke with us!

2726 W Britton Rd Oklahoma City, OK 405-942-0070

1801 Cornwell Dr. Suite 301 Yukon, OK 2nd Location NOW Open 405-494-7188

www.ztcigars.com (800) 340-3007 W W W.GOLFOKL AHOMA.ORG

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News around the state Sponsored by

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low play is golf’s 600-pound gorilla and right now the game’s hottest topic, in part caused by two PGA Tour stars, Brooks Koepka and Rory McIlroy, pointing the finger at another PGA Tour star, Bryson DeChambeau.

There are really two issues in the pace-ofplay conundrum and any discussion must recognize this duality. On the world’s professional tours, the mind-numbing pace is of concern, but the much more important issue is the effect of five-hour rounds on the golf industry’s fiscal health.

In the case of the PGA Tour, we should not get bogged down listening to excuses or picking over historical minutiae such as DeChambeau saying he may take extra time strategizing with his caddy, but he walks fast getting to the ball. The Tour has a heck of a problem and it’s inconceivable it doesn’t understand what is at stake. Management says the topic is undergoing intense study

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but that’s been its line for as many years as I can remember. There is a pace-of-play policy, but it’s unenforced, leaving one to conclude they don’t see the funereal fairway march in the same light as the rest of us.

In July, it was announced that for the 2019-20 season, the 36-hole cut was reduced from the low 70 players and ties to the low 65 and ties. Also, the thirdround cut, used when the Friday cut resulted in 78 players, was abolished. Removing five players from the weekend is not exactly an aggressive attack on slow play because the problem is often not on Saturday and Sunday but Thursday and Friday. The most significant result of the new cut line is five fewer players will have a chance to earn a living that week.

On the other side of the pond, the European Tour is not hesitating to confront inordinately long rounds as evidenced by the successful Shot Clock Masters. Chief Executive

Keith Pelley announced a plan Illustration by CHRIS SWAFFORD to speed the pace-of-play for the 2020 season, coincidentally after Tour member Edoardo Molinari published a list of slow players who had received fines for bad times. Molinari, brother of 2018 Open champion Francesco, believes if slow players have the spotlight shone on them, they would play faster.

The European Tour’s new pace-of-play policy covers four main points: an immediate one-shot penalty for two bad times in a round; an increase of fines for those dur-

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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ing the season consistently “on the clock”; a player-education program plus additional technological innovation; and changing the field size of events where appropriate from 156 players to 144.

Without the Euros playing even one event, a few have already questioned the fairness of the new policy while others see the need for doing something even if modifications are needed. Slow play is like the weather – everyone talks about it, but no one does anything about it and the European Tour’s attempt is, if nothing else, refreshing.

“Excruciatingly boring” was the verdict on the LPGA’s Solheim Cup delivered by a 19th-hole TV viewer, who is a banking executive and avid golfer introduced to the game as a young girl. “I’ve got lots of better things to do this afternoon besides watching a bunch of women taking their sweet time over shots that are really straight forward.

It’s like watching paint dry.” This opinion echoed LPGA Tour star Stacy Lewis’ Tweet during the Evian Championship in July. “I will never understand 5 hours and 50 minutes to play a round of golf! It’s not fun for us as players, can’t be fun to watch!”

Lewis and my friend voiced the frustra-

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

tion of faster players, but both more importantly recognize that fans do become bored and opt not go to tournaments or watch on television. Declining attention from fans could mean advertisers and tournament sponsors will find professional golf no longer an appropriate investment which would leave the tours in serious trouble.

The USGA has not been exactly proactive either. However, for the USGA, the new Rule 5.6 “encourages prompt pace of play by recommending that: Players should recognize that their pace of play affects others and they should play promptly throughout the round (such as by preparing in advance for each stroke and moving promptly between strokes and in going to the next tee), A player should make a stroke in no more than 40 seconds (and usually in less time) after the player is able to play without interference or distraction, and Committees should adopt a Pace of Play Policy (rather than only say they may do so).”

While at this year’s U.S. Open the pace of play was reasonable (about 4 ½ hours for Sunday’s final group), the 6-hour treks for qualifying rounds are legendary.

However, the most important part of the

problem is recreational players, those paying the greens fees, buying lunch, purchasing new equipment – in other words, spending the money to make the industry viable.

Golfers may not especially care if Bryson DeChambeau takes over two minutes to hit an 8-foot putt that rolls 4-feet past, but they are vitally concerned with the pace of the foursome ahead of them on Saturday morning.

Course operators must find ways to manage players exhibiting selfish, inconsiderate behavior. If not, amateur golf will be saddled with the waiting game unless the unlikely happens and there is a basic change in human nature.

Illustrating the fuzzy thinking heard more than once about pace of play, it is said the typical 20-handicap weekend player will somehow magically begin playing more quickly if the PGA Tour can somehow slash 30 minutes from an average round. Sorry, but this is not only illogical but presumes the dawdlers in front of us care about the effect of their inconsiderate behavior.

The real tragedy inherent in slow play is people are being pushed away from golf and that relentlessly diminishes the game.

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Team Tulsa, left to right; Allen Field, Jesse Tandoy, Harrison Shaw, Chase Jones, Cameron Surles, Porter Hart, Benton Manly, Sam Morris, Peyton Coburn, William Hennessee, coach Amanda Fisher.

Team Tulsa crashes PGA Jr. League finals

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eam Tulsa advanced through both sectional and regional qualifying to earn one of 12 berths in the 2019 PGA Jr. League Championship Oct. 11-14 at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz.

The Tulsa team, comprised of all-star performers from around the Tulsa area courses, defeated a team from Arkansas that had previously dominated play at the section level in extra holes at The Club at Indian Springs, then cruised through regional action at Lake of the Ozarks.

Team members are: Porter Hart, 9, Battle Creek Golf Course Porter, the youngest player on the team, loves basketball and baseball as well. He has been a U.S. Kids Player of the Year at ages 6, 7, 8 and 9.

Jesse Tandoy, 13, Broken Arrow Golf and Athletic Club Jesse is on the Union High School junior varsity team, has played world wide in U.S. Kids Golf championships including the European Open, Venice Open, Australian Open and Canadian Open, also plays basketball and drums.

Peyton Coburn, 13, Lit’l Links Golf Academy Peyton won five events on the 2019 South Central Section Junior Tour and was sec18

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ond twice. She plays for All Saints Catholic Middle School in Broken Arrow where she is Student Council Co-President and a National Junior Honor Society member.

Will Hennessee, 14, Battle Creek Golf Course Will’s play in OJGT, AJGA and other junior circuits is already turning heads in the college ranks. Will is currently ranked sixth in the world for his age in the world golf rankings. He is a true leader on and off the golf course.

Harrison Shaw, 11, Battle Creek Golf Course Harrison has won more than 40 regional events on the U.S. Kids Golf Tour and finished 18th in the World Championship at Pinehurst, N.C. Harrison also loves basketball and plays trombone in jazz band at Carver Middle School.

Allen Field, 12, Battle Creek Golf Course Allen is a passionate player and excellent putter with numerous wins on the U.S. Kids circuit as well as other state and regional events.

Benton Manly, 13, Oaks Country Club, Benton excels in the classroom and on the golf course for Regent Prep winning two middle school tournaments in the spring and finishing runner-up in a third. Plays a sched-

ule of U.S. Kids, South Central, and OJGT events.

Cameron Surles, 14, Battle Creek Golf Club Surles is a walking encyclopedia of sports knowledge and trivia. He put his own name in the record book by sinking the winning putt after four sudden death playoff holes that sent Tulsa to regionals. Cameron plays for the Broken Arrow Middle School golf and basketball teams.

Sam Morris, 13, Oaks Country Club Sam recently placed fourth in the Hurricane Junior Golf Tour Summer World Championship in Orlando, Fla., and is also a member of the Jenks Trojan basketball and golf teams. Sam is coming off a recent win in the OJGT at Lincoln Park.

Chase Jones, 12, Battle Creek Golf Course Chase is a decorated player with many U.S. Kids victories and a Player of the Year.

Honor. He enjoys all sports and loves to hunt and fish. His Native American nickname is MoonBear. Chase may seem quiet but his game speaks volumes.

Amanda Fisher, Coach.

Amanda is an instructor at Battle Creek Golf Course and has taught in the Tulsa area for 17 years since completing a decorated college career at Oral Roberts University.

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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Southern Hills Country Club

Get an early jump on 2021 Senior PGA Championship tickets It’s time to get the next major golf championship in Oklahoma on your long-distance radar.

The 2021 KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship at Southern Hills Country Club will be here before you know it. Already here working daily on the event is Championship Director Bryan Karns,. He and his staff have set up offices in a mobile unit near the course and are busy planning for the major early work, particularly operations,

volunteers, corporate sales and ticket sales.

Tickets will go on sale in April and that is also when volunteers will be able to sign up for specific duties. However, you can get your name in early for both by going to attend.srpga.com/2021 and signing up now.

Karns noted that the corporate sales portion of his job has been made easier by Southern Hills selling a record amount of corporate packages for a Senior PGA Championship even before his arrival. He is hop-

ing that translates into strong ticket sales and volunteer signups as well as Tulsa and Oklahoma show their eagerness for the latest major championship to be held in the state and at Southern Hills.

The championship is scheduled May 2730 which is also Memorial Day weekend.

Karns said the PGA Championship at Southern Hills is still going to be either 2025 or 2030, the only two dates not yet officially announced in the window in which the PGA of America pledged to bring the event to Southern Hills.

Cozby leaves Ping for top Elizabeth Freeman is 2019 post with Thunderbirds Everett Dobson Award recipient Chance Cozby so enElizabeth Freeman of Oklahoma Chris- homa Christian, helping the team to eight tian University was named the first female tournament victories. She had three top-10 recipient of the Everett Dobson Award by and 14 top-20 individual finishes and was a three-time Women’s Golf Coaches Assothe Oklahoma Golf Hall of Fame.

The Everett Dobson Award is a $5,000 ciation All-America Scholar and made the Heartland Conference President’s cash award to help a collegiate Honor Roll (3.5 GPA or higher) all golfer embark on a career after eight semesters of her career. graduating from their university.

Freeman graduated magna Freeman is enrolled in law school cum laude in April with a Bacheat Oklahoma City University lor of Science in History/Pre Law. with a goal of becoming an adIn addition to her studies and vocate for children. golf, she was president of the “I want to work on issues such student athlete advisory comas foster care, termination of pamittee, a leader in an on-campus rental rights and child support, social service club and a member in hopes of placing a child in the right direction for the best life Elizabeth Freeman of Phi Alpha Theta, a national possible,” Freeman said in her application. history honors society, in which she was “Ultimately, I want to use my legal educa- selected to present a paper at a regional tion to be the voice for children who do conference this year.

“I am so proud of Elizabeth,” said OC not have someone to protect them and/or coach Greg Lynn. “She always puts others stand up for their rights and their life.”

“Being able to participate on the Everett first and still is always prepared to give her Dobson Award Committee is a great hon- best at everything. She is so very deserving or, but it’s not easy, we have great nomi- of this honor!”

Freeman will receive the honor at the nations,” said Lew Erickson, chair of the Awards Committee. “Elizabeth’s nomina- 2019 Oklahoma Golf Hall of Fame Induction stood out as she completed four years tion Dinner scheduled Nov. 24 at Southern of golf at OC and has started law school. Hills Country Club. The 2019 class includes While at OC she showed diligence, disci- Melissa McNamara Luellen, Bill Glasson, pline and patience, while excelling at aca- Orville Moody, Jim Awtrey and William Nichols. Tickets and more information are demics and athletics.”

Freeman impressed the selection com- available at www.oklahomagolfhof.org.

“I am so grateful to win the award and mittee with a heartfelt essay on what the game has meant to her and how her ap- to be the first female recipient,” Freeman preciation deepened for the game during a said. “It’s so cool that Mr. Dobson gives time her father, who introduced her to golf, this award and I don’t know if he truly realizes just how much it means and will be suffered serious health issues.

Freeman was a four-year starter for Okla- a benefit.”

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joyed his time running the Phoenix Open and working on the charitable aspects of The Thunderbirds that he made a career switch.

Cozby, the youngest of the three Cozby sons Chance Cozby from Bartlesville, left his post as vice president of sports development with Ping after 20 years to become the executive director of The Thunderbirds, hosts of the Waste Management Phoenix Open.

He will officially replace current executive Director John Bridger in spring of 2020.

A member of The Thunderbirds since 2010, Cozby was the Tournament Chairman for the 2019 Waste Management Phoenix Open and is currently Big Chief of The Thunderbirds and President of Thunderbirds Charities.

“This was just the right opportunity at the right time,” Cozby told Golf Oklahoma.

“I’ve spent 20 years working for the best golf company, now to be working on the biggest and best PGA Tour event and one that helps funnel $14 million into the community is a great opportunity. It’s a job that benefits me and my family and there’s not much travel, so all those boxes have been checked.”

Chance and his wife Erica have two sons, Campbell, 15, and Catcher, 13.

Chance, like brothers Cary and Craig, grew up playing at Hillcrest Country Club in Bartlesville where his father Jerry was the head PGA professional and his mother Karole shuttled the three around the state to various junior events. All three played collegiately for the University of Oklahoma.

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OK L A HOM A COU R SE N EWS

Coming in 2020

The new Payne’s Valley Course designed by Tiger Woods will open next spring as part of the Big Cedar Golf Resort near Branson.

Leaving in 2020? by ken macleod

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he future of Sequoyah State Park Golf Course is in question after a fiscal year in which massive flooding exacerbated a trend of declining rounds played since the recession in 2007-08.

Executive Director of the Oklahoma Tourism and Recreation Department Jerry Winchester said that only approximately 3,500 rounds had been played at the course in the fiscal year 2018-19, meaning the state was subsidizing each round played by nearly $68 per round and by over $250,000 on an annual basis.

A decision on whether the state will close the course is expected to be made

by November. Winchester said savings at Sequoyah could potentially benefit the other state park golf courses, which include courses at Beavers Bend State Park, Lake Murray State Park, Arrowhead Golf Course at Lake Eufaula State Park, Roman Nose State Park, Fort Cobb State Park and 22

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Grand Cherokee Golf Course near the Pen- closed due to flooding. A 2015 renovation of the lodge has proven extremely popusacola Dam. “We’re having some hard conversations lar, but room nights haven’t translated into about the course,” said Winchester, a for- higher usage of the course.

This year the course flooded in late mer oil and gas executive who was appointed director of Oklahoma Tourism April and was basically a nine-hole course in April. “It’s not just the annual subsidy that is the issue.

There’s been a lot of deferred maintenance. It needs new irrigation, new carts, new mowers. We could sink almost half of our golf budget into a course that loses $250,000 annually just to get it back in shape.”

Flooding has long been an issue at Sequoyah, formerly Western Hills GC, as several of the holes are shoreline holes on Fort Gibson Lake. The Future of Sequoyah State Park Golf Course up in air. course averaged closer to 11,000 rounds annually a decade ago, but those through the end of August.

In addition to serving guests at the lodge, numbers have fluctuated mostly depending on how many weeks parts of the course are the golf course gets regular visitors from the GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

area, particularly from Wagoner which has no public course. The Wagoner high school golf team uses Sequoyah for practice. Winchester said he would be open to conversations with municipalities or individuals who would be willing to share or take over ownership and responsibility for the course.

Although all of the state park courses are subsidized to some degree, Winchester said massive cuts to the overall tourism department and state parks budget in the past five years have made it imperative to take a hard look at the weakest performers. Some little used state parks may be in line for closing while entrance fees are being considered for the most popular, Winchester said.

“Although appropriations to the tourism budget are down 25 percent, we’re one of the few state agencies that does generate revenue and we have to look for ways to enhance that,” Winchester said.

Sequoyah State Park Golf Course was designed by noted Oklahoma architect Floyd Fairley and opened in 1964. It converted to Champion ultradwarf Bermuda greens in the past five years, helping provide firmer and faster greens in the summer. Making the course less prone to flooding would require a much more substantial investment including moving holes to higher ground.

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OK L A HOM A COU R SE N EWS

Restoring an

Rolling fairways and bunkers more closely resembling Perry Maxwell’s style shown on the par-4 fourth hole.

Oklahoma classic

fall. Some movement was added and playing corridors shifted slightly depending on rchitect Tripp Davis calls it one trees removed, of which there were many. of the best restoration projects The fairways were sodded – over 3.7 milhe’s been involved with, and lion square feet – this spring with Latitude 36, a strain of Bermuda developed at Oklathat’s saying a lot.

Davis has worked on dozens of promi- homa State University.

“Just having the new grass in the fairnent restorations from coast to coast, including many here in his home state of Oklahoma (Oak Tree National, Jimmie Austin OU Golf Course, Hillcrest Country Club, to name a few). What he’s done at Oklahoma City Golf & Country Club, however, stands out for him, for a variety of reasons.

Perry Maxwell is one of Davis’ architectural heroes and he did some of his finest work, along with consultation from the legendary Alister MacKenzie, at Oklahoma City G&CC, which opened in 1929. The opportunity to have a significant impact and help improve such a treaLooking up the 18th fairway. sured course was one factor.

The other was how Davis’ team meshed ways is going to make a huge difference,” with superintendent Nathan Neumann said Director of Golf Tim Fleming. “We’ve and the course renovation company LaBar had common Bermuda probably ever since the club opened in 1929 and in the winter Golf of Basking Ridge, N.J. “They’ve all done a great job,” Davis and spring the lies were really thin. With said. “I couldn’t be more proud of how this this grass we’ll gain about three to four weeks on each end (coming out of dorhas turned out.”

The major restoration began with kill- mancy earlier and staying green later in the ing off the existing Bermuda fairways last season). But it’s not just the color, it’s the by ken macleod

A

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playability.”

All tee boxes were rebuilt. Greens were restored to original sizes to recapture some additional pin placements and slopes were carefully recreated to match what was there previously. The greens will use 007 bent grass.

The bunker style changed dramatically as Davis went with a more natural look closer to what the course had when it opened, just as Gil Hanse did at Southern Hills in his restoration there.

Cart paths were moved to become less visible from the tee boxes. A completely new and modernized irrigation system was installed, giving Neumann much more thorough control of the moisture content throughout the course.

Select trees were removed to allow better air flow and sunlight and also for strategic and aesthetic reasons. On the horseshoe-shaped par-5 13th hole, for example, Davis removed dozens of trees down the right side to create a landing area that would allow better visibility of the green and the layup area.

“That second shot on 13 was the most difficult shot on the golf course,” Fleming said. “I’ve only knocked it on that green in two once in my lifetime and that was almost an accident. Now you’ll actually be able to see the layup area and the green, which will entice some guys to go for it.”

On the 12th hole, some trees were re-

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

Bunkers front and left and water behind on the short but dangerous par-4 eighth hole. moved down the right side to allow golfers to be more aggressive in attacking the short, sharp dogleg right par-4, but features were also adjusted to ensure those who miss their lines pay the price. Those are perhaps the two most awkward holes on the course and both have been improved.

Elsewhere, Davis used subtle fairway mounding, tree removal and bunkering to slightly shift approach angles and tweak strategy a bit for all skill levels. It will be

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

interesting to get the reaction of longtime members next spring after becoming reacquainted. Fleming doesn’t think the difficultly of the course will change much, but the experience will be better.

“It looks terrific and our members are going to absolutely love it,” Fleming said.

“Tripp, Nathan and all the contractors have done a wonderful job.”

While Fleming has a new toy in an indoor teaching center loaded with Track-

man, SAM Putting Lab, Swing Catalyst and more technology, Neumann is delighted with his own new irrigation system.

“Irrigation and drainage were the two biggest components of this restoration project to me,” Neumann said. “The old system was 50 years old and they haven’t even made replacement (sprinkler) heads for it for 25 years. To have control on the distribution of the water is going to be a huge deal.”

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OK L A HOM A COU R SE N EWS

Artist’s renderings of the new clubhouse at The Canyons at Blackjack Ridge

Sand Springs invests in The Canyons Benton will be able to bring golfers through Talley’s office to the learning center, a byhe Canyons at Blackjack Ridge in appointment only room for lessons and Sand Springs will be enjoying a club fitting featuring Trackman, Foresight new clubhouse, new greens and golf simulators, a practice putting green new bunkers thanks to $2.2 million in cap- and more.

GH2 Architects did the design work on ital improvements allocated through the city’s latest general obligation bond pack- the new clubhouse. It’s expected that the clubhouse work will begin in February, age passed in 2017.

The new clubhouse will essentially cor- with the course closing in the spring to rect a design flaw in the current clubhouse renovate the greens.

The design work on the greens and bunwhich has a huge pro shop at the south end.

The new pro shop will be condensed to 900 kers was spearheaded by Conor Cummings square feet and will be perched at the north of Heckenkemper Golf. The greens will be end with views for the professional staff of converted from bent grass to G2 Champion the first and 10th tees, driving range and Bermuda and also expanded considerably to recapture area lost over the past 25 years putting green.

A large portion of the clubhouse will since the last greens renovation.

Talley, whose company Talley Golf conbe designated for a banquet room for the course which currently holds over 100 tracts with the City of Sand Springs to run tournaments on an annual basis and will all golf operations at The Canyons, said he be seeking more. There is also currently a was slow to be convinced that Bermuda large stone patio with additional seating was the way to go, but visits to The Greens and Quail Creek Golf & Country Club in for tournaments.

PGA professionals Brian Talley and Ben Oklahoma City, Firelake Golf Course in Shawnee and others persuaded him that it was the right move.

“We have a small staff and when we’re paying some high school kid $10 an hour to syringe greens in July and he makes a mistake, we put the entire summer at risk,” Talley said. “With the ultradwarf, we’ll have greens in great condition when we have the majority of our play. Now I don’t have to be buying fans and I can be spending more time on the nitpicking stuff that makes the course better rather than just syringing greens all day.”

One of the new bunkers on The Lakes at The Club The bunker project will include at Indian Springs. Photo by David Jones new liners, all redesigned bunkers by ken macleod

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and white sand that will make the bunkers pop visually. Select tree removal will provide more sunlight to greens and also open up some of the vistas of the surrounding Osage hills and downtown Tulsa that help make this property one of the most unique and fun courses in the state.

“With the terrain and the rock outcroppings, there’s really not much like it except The Patriot,” Cummings said. “We wanted to accentuate the views and make it more playable rather than tricking anything up.”

Superintendent Nick Neal has previously worked at Tulsa Country Club, The Oaks, Buffalo Rock and most recently WinStar Resort. He is justifiably proud of the ongoing improvements he and Talley have worked on at the Canyons and is excited at what the bond money will provide. Included in the package is new double-row irrigation for the greens and surrounds.

Heckenkemper Golf will also be renovating the John Conrad Course in Midwest City but the majority of that project is scheduled for 2021.

The Club at Indian Springs The Lakes Course at The Club at Indian Springs has been enjoying new bunkers this summer, with the work completed inhouse by superintendent David Jones and his staff.

Jones’ crew removed all the old sand, put in new Sand Trapper II liners and replaced the sand. The previous year they redid all the bunkers on the River Course, using a crushed limestone base.

“They certainly drain a lot better,” Jones said. “With all the rains, our bunkers have been very labor intensive and we’ve had to spend a lot of time pushing up all the sides.

This has helped a lot.”

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PROFESSIONA L SPOT L IGH T “It changed my life in terms of continuing to improve,” Van Pelt said. “It took me a while to get my strength back and my range of motion and everything. It finally got to a point where I could get out there and see how I can play.”

Van Pelt said removing the rib was a far more complex procedure than Pearl described.

“This guy, just because he does so many of them, was pretty nonchalant about it,” Van Pelt said, forcing a chuckle. “He said, ‘I’ll just take this out, man, and you’ll be fine.’ When I got back into PT (physical therapy), I realized it definitely wasn’t a sure thing. There were other doctors I talked to who said, ‘Man, I’m glad you went to a good guy. I’ve seen people try that surgery and it doesn’t end well. People basically lose the feeling in their right arm.

A lot of bad things can happen.’ ” After three years of debilitating pain, now comes hope.

Van Pelt made his return to the PGA Tour at the Safeway Open in late September in Napa Valley, Calif. Van Pelt opened with an even-par 72 and made the cut.

“I’m feeling good,” Van Pelt said before the tournament. “It’s been a weird journey, that’s for sure. I’m anxious to see how I perform when it really counts. You just don’t know. You can try to simulate coming back.

I’ve tried everything the last couple weeks.

When you step up on that tee and they hand you that scorecard, it’s just a different deal.

It’ll be interesting to see how I handle it.”

Van Pelt will be exempt from qualifying for the entire 2019-20 season thanks to his career money status.

The 44-year-old Van Pelt has pocketed nearly $20.5 million in official PGA Tour prize money. He has six tour victories worldwide and his lone PGA Tour win came at the 2009 U.S. Bank Championship in Milwaukee with a birdie on the second playoff hole.

When a healthy Van Pelt previously found his stride, he was a birdie machine, placing in the Top 25 six times in birdie average from 2004-12.

Since the 2016 Waste Management Phoenix Open, Van Pelt’s pain threshold constantly has been challenged, along with his mental toughness and confidence. In the end, stamina was the deciding factor to make his return.

“It was being able to practice over an extended period of time and an extended period of days,” Van Pelt said. “It’s not about just

Bo Van Pelt with his trainer Clint Howard.

Van Pelt is back on the PGA Tour after missing nearly four years with injuries.

Bo is Back! by john rohde

F

or a span of four PGA Tour seasons, Bo Van Pelt’s injured right shoulder showed no signs of healing. Oddly enough, the former Oklahoma State All-American viewed this as a good thing because he never carried any false hope of physically being able to return to professional golf.

“The past 3½ years, I haven’t missed a shot that mattered,” Van Pelt said. “I think there’s an advantage to that as far as not having the mental scars of playing bad, or trying to play through an injury, or trying to make a comeback that way. I wasn’t even getting close to that point in my mind just because of the pain I was having.”

In the winter of 2015, Van Pelt reached into the back seat of his truck to grab one of his kids’ backpacks.

“I lifted it and it was probably 20 pounds heavier that I thought it would be,” Van Pelt said. “I tried to play through the pain for a couple months. I played in the Phoenix Open (in early February) and was in the top 10 going into the weekend (after shooting backto-back 68s). By the weekend, I couldn’t even put my arm behind my back it hurt so bad. I tried to play the following week (at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am) and thought, ‘Man, I’ve got to go home and get an MRI.” Test results showed Van Pelt had shredded roughly 85 percent of the labrum in his right shoulder when he lifted that overweight backpack.

“There really was nothing I could do except have surgery,” Van Pelt said. “They told me I was going to be out a year, at least.”

After a year, Van Pelt’s shoulder wasn’t getting any better. He was unable to hit long irons and his driver, so more surgery was scheduled.

“They went back in and cleaned it up,” Van Pelt said. “They found nine bone spurs in 30

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my AC (acromioclavicular) joint and thought that would help, removing those. Again, I just wasn’t getting any better. I couldn’t practice. As soon as I hit one shot that hurt, every shot after that just kept getting worse.”

It marked the first time Van Pelt had missed time on tour because of injury since he turned pro in 1998.

“I was doing everything the doctors were telling me,” Van Pelt said. “I was rehabbing it all the time. From a golf standpoint, I just couldn’t get there. I guess that was the blessing in disguise. It definitely was frustrating, but I thoroughly enjoyed the time at home with my wife (Carrie) and kids (Olivia, Chase and Crew). I had been on the road pretty much 17 years in a row, so that was definitely a blessing.”

Late in the summer of 2018, Van Pelt’s right hand would go numb when he tried to practice.

“I pretty much thought I was done with golf, to be quite honest,” Van Pelt said.

Just before Christmas, Van Pelt went to an orthopedic surgeon in Dallas and asked, “Is there anything I haven’t tried? I’m kind of to the point where I need a ‘Hail Mary.’ ” The doctor referred Van Pelt to vascular surgeon Dr. Gregory Pearl, who was just down the street.

Van Pelt was diagnosed with thoracic outlet syndrome, which is described as “a group of disorders that occur when blood vessels or nerves are compressed in the space between your collarbone and your first rib.”

Pearl informed Van Pelt, “I need to remove your first rib and I think you’re going to be OK. There’s no stretching or therapy that’s going to fix that area, so I need to take your rib out.”

Van Pelt replied, “Look, I’m willing to try anything.”

Surgery was performed in late January this year and after a month of soreness, which was expected, Van Pelt began feeling progress.

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

being able to finish 18 holes. It’s do you have the ability to prepare to get ready to play?

People don’t understand how hard people practice just to be able to play one tournament, or a couple in a row. When I got to the point where I thought I could withstand a week or multiple weeks of preparation, then it was time to give it a go.”

Van Pelt said he will be deliberate in setting his upcoming schedule, which actually has always been the case.

“It’s just a matter of listening to my body,” Van Pelt said. “Even before I got hurt, you always had a schedule in mind, but it was always kind of a work in progress. There’s got to be some flexibility in there. If you’re not at your best mentally and physically, you’re better off not playing.”

Throughout his career, Van Pelt has done extensive physical therapy with Clint Howard, who is founder/director of Tulsa Fitness Systems and a Golf Digest Top 50 Fitness Expert.

“Rehab was just kind of a slow, steady progression of doing better from a physical therapy and golf standpoint for the last six or seven months,” Van Pelt said. “As I’ve gotten stronger, I’ve been able to get in with him (Howard) more consistently. He’s been great and I think it’s a good litmus test for

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

me because when I was playing my best, I was working out with him. It’s another set of eyes to help tell me, ‘Hey, how am I doing?’ ” Van Pelt began training with Howard nine years ago, which coincided with Van Pelt’s most successful seasons on tour when

Bo Van Pelt back in action this fall. he placed in the Top 30 in the annual FedEx Cup standings from 2010-12.

“He’s even more fired up and motivated now than he was back then,” Howard said. “He’s excited. He believes in himself and his talent. He knows there’s going to be some jitters and knocking some rust off, plus there are a lot of talented players out there. From a physical standpoint, he’s

good. From a motivational standpoint, he’s pumped. I’ve never seen the fire in his eyes and in his belly that there is right now.”

Van Pelt has dropped 15-20 pounds and had three weekly workout sessions the past three months in preparation for rejoining the tour.

Howard said he believes in many ways Van Pelt has returned to the physical level he was at prior to injuring the shoulder.

“All his strength is back,” Howard said.

“His swing speed is just as good as it was, if not better. He knows his body. He knows what it takes to go out there and compete at a high level.”

Van Pelt primarily practiced at Southern Hills and Cedar Ridge while he was sidelined, but also made visits to the Golf Club of Oklahoma, Forest Ridge and other area courses.

“Tulsa’s been really good to me,” said Van Pelt, an Indiana native. “I’ve lived here 20 years. At different periods of time, I’ve probably called (all those courses) home. Those guys have always been great to me. People were always out there checking on me, even when all I could do was putt and chip. ‘Hey, how’s it going? Can’t wait ‘till you get back.’

That’s definitely been encouraging.”

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PROFESSIONA L SPOT L IGH T

Oklahoma ties on the PGA Tour in 2019-20 by john rohde

Oklahoma may not fare well on a lot of lists but when it comes to players with state ties on the PGA Tour and Champions Tour, we more than hold our own. Here some folks to follow this year.

Willie Wood: One of the most accomplished junior amateur players in history, turned pro in 1983 after winning eight tournaments at Oklahoma State. Now 58, does not have exempt status on the Champions Tour, but will try to gain entry in as many events as possible before retiring. Just shy of $3 million in career earnings. Won the PGA Tour’s Deposit Guaranty Classic in 1996 and won two Champions Tour events in a span of three starts in 2012. Also won the Oklahoma Open twice (1990, 1995), the Colorado Open (1984) and Nevada Open (1979).

Member of the 1983 Walker Cup. Plays out of Oak Tree National, where he lives.

Scott Verplank: This 1984 U.S. Amateur champ

from OSU is a two-time Ryder Cup member (2002, 2006), two-time Presidents Cup (2005, 2007) member, a 1985 Walker Cup member and the 1986 NCAA individual champion. Became the first amateur in 29 years to win a PGA Tour event at the 1985 Western Open. Now 55, he has nearly $30 million in career earnings. Exempt on Champions Tour as a Top 10 available player on the current all-time money list. Five PGA Tour wins and won nine tournaments with OSU. Plays out of Oak Tree National, where he lives.

Brandt Jobe: An Oklahoma City native who attended UCLA is approaching $9.3 million in career earnings at age 54. Earned exempt status on Champions Tour for being in the top 54 from previous year’s final PGA Tour Champions money list, provided they are among the Top 50 on such list. Pro career began with wide-ranging success overseas with 13 victories on Canadian, Asia and Japan tours from 1990-98. Also has two career Champions Tour wins. Lives in Edmond

and is a member of Oak Tree National.

PGA Tour bios (listed by age) Bo Van Pelt: Returns to the PGA Tour for the first time since early in the 2016 season after suffering a serious right shoulder injury that required the removal of a rib. At age 44, has nearly $20.5 million in career earnings, which gave him exempt status for the upcoming season. Won the PGA Tour’s U.S. Bank Championship in 2009, the Omaha Classic on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2003 and has three other victories worldwide. First-team All-American at OSU, where he won three tournaments. Lives in Tulsa.

Charles Howell III: With $38.7 million in career earnings, this 40-year-old is one of only nine players to qualify for the FedExCup Playoffs in each of the first 13 seasons of the competition. Placed 28th last season. Has three PGA Tour victories, most recently the 2019 RSM Classic, where he led wire-to-wire.

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Also has 16 career runner-up finishes on tour. Two-time Presidents Cup member (2003, 2007). Was 2000 NCAA champion as junior at OSU with a record winning total of 23-under. Won Jack Nicklaus and Fred Haskins awards in college and was the 1996 AJGA Player of the Year. Lives in Orlando.

Hunter Mahan: Highly decorated 37-year-old OSU product turned pro in 2003, has amassed $30.7 million in career earnings and has six PGA Tour victories.

Exempt this season with a minor medical extension. He also placed in the Top 25 from the previous year’s Korn Ferry Tour. Three-time Ryder Cup member (2008, 2010, 2014) and four-time Presidents Cup member (2007, 2009, 2011, 2013).

Swept prestigious Jack Nicklaus, Fred Haskins and Ben Hogan awards in 2003 at OSU. Lives in Dallas.

Alex Noren: Exempt on PGA Tour by placing No. 129 in last year’s FedExCup standings. This 37-year-old also plays on the European circuit and was a 2018 Ryder Cup team member. Turned pro in 2005, has nearly $4.6 in career earnings and won 11 tournaments worldwide, but none on the PGA Tour. Was two-time All-American at OSU alongside Hunter Mahan and Pablo Martin. Lives in native Stockholm, Sweden.

Rhein Gibson: This Oklahoma Christian standout and Australian native is 33 and turned pro in 2009.

Earned PGA Tour status by placing 12th on Korn Ferry Tour last season with $262,933 in earnings, boosted by his victory at the BMW Charity Pro-Am. Has more than $1 million in career earnings. In May 2012, shot 16-under 55 at River Oaks Golf Club, which officially was later recognized as the lowest round of all-time. Plays out of Oak Tree National and lives in Edmond.

Robert Streb: Placed 128th in the 2019 FedExCup standings, earning him exempt status this upcoming season along with his previous success on Korn Ferry Tour. Winner of 2015 The McGladrey Classic on PGA Tour and two KFT events with the 2012 Mylan Classic and 2018 Nationwide Children’s Hospital Championship. At age 32, has GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

more than $10 million in career earnings since turning pro in 2009. Born in Chickasha, helped build the powerhouse Edmond North High School team dynasty and played collegiately at Kansas State. Resides in Shawnee, Kan. Kevin Tway: Posted his first PGA Tour victory at last season’s Safeway Open, earning him exempt status for at least two seasons. Also won the 2013 Albertsons Boise Open on the Korn Ferry Tour. More than $6 million in career earnings since turning pro in 2011. Finished No. 31 in last year’s FedExCup standings, missing out on the Tour Championship by one spot. Has advanced to three straight FedExCup playoffs. Won four tournaments at OSU and won the U.S. Junior Amateur at age 16. Now 31, resides in Jupiter, Fla., and plays out of Oak Tree National.

Rickie Fowler: Fourtime Ryder Cup member (2010, 2014, 2016, 2018), plus two Presidents Cups (2015, 2017) and two Walker Cups (2007, 2009).

Five career wins on PGA Tour, plus four more wins internationally.

Claimed the 2015 PLAYERS Championship. Has qualified for 10 straight FedExCup playoffs and placed 19th last season.

Was the only player to finish in the Top 5 of all four major championships in 2014. Now 30, has just shy of $38 million in career earnings. Turned pro in 2009 and has been playing golf since age 3. Won Ben Hogan and Phil Mickelson awards at OSU. Lives in Jupiter, Fla. Peter Uihlein: Twotime Walker Cup member (2009, 2011) earned exempt status on PGA Tour based by finishing No. 133 on the 2019 FedExCup points list (Nos. 126-150), and also by winning a Korn Ferry Tour event within the last two years (2017 Nationwide Children’s Hospital Championship). Now 30, won the 2010 U.S. Amateur at Chambers Bay on his 21st birthday – the first OSU player since Scott Verplank in 1984 to win that event. Won the 2013 Madeira Islands Open on European Tour. Lives in Jupiter, Fla. Morgan Hoffmann: Following his facioscapulohumeral muscular dys-

trophy diagnosis, launched the Morgan Hoffmann Foundation dedicated to finding a cure for muscular dystrophy and improving the physical and mental wellness against neuromuscular diseases. Granted exempt status this season on Major Medical Extension: If granted by the PGA Tour Commissioner, if not otherwise eligible, and if needed to fill the field, by Special Medical Extension. Was 2009 Walker Cup and Palmer Cup member and joined tour in 2013. Phil Mickelson Award winner at OSU as nation’s top freshman. Now age 30, lives in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. Abraham Ancer: Former University of Oklahoma player has thrived recently on the PGA Tour, tying for 21st in last year’s FedExCup playoffs. Has won more than $5.1 million in career since turning pro in 2013. Is a past champion on Korn Ferry Tour at 2015 Nova Scotia Open, but is still looking for first PGA Tour win. Played for Odessa Junior College before transferring to OU. This 28-year-old plays out of Reynosa, Mexico, and lives in San Antonio.

Talor Gooch: Finished 101st on last year’s FedExCup standings in 17 starts, earning him exempt status on the PGA Tour this season. Former OSU player who turned pro in 2014 and has more than $2.1 million in career earnings. Last year marked the first time the 27-year-old has advanced to the FedExCup playoffs. Had consecutive Top-5 finishes on tour in late January. Won 2017 News Sentinel Open on Korn Ferry Tour. Plays out of Oak Tree National and lives in Edmond.

Michael Gellerman: Claimed the 2019 KC Golf Classic and placed 22nd on the Korn Ferry Tour, earning him exempt status on PGA Tour this season.

Turned pro in 2015 after playing for OU. Grew up on a nine-hole course in Sterling, Kan., that did not have bunkers or a driving range. Will be a PGA Tour rookie at age 27. Plays out of Oak Tree National and lives in Edmond.

Wyndham Clark: Placed 64th on last season’s FedExCup standings, earning him exempt status on PGA Tour for this season.

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PROFESSIONA L SPOT L IGH T Was one of eight rookies to qualif y for last season’s FedExCup playoffs and one of five to advance to the BMW Championship. Was All-American and Big 12 Player of the Year in 2014 as sophomore at Oklahoma State and was a Palmer Cup member before transferring to Oregon. Nearly $1.4 million in career earnings for this 25-year-old. Lives in Las Vegas.

Kristoffer Ventura: Finished No. 4 on 2019 Korn Ferr y Tour money list with $ 336,234 and was a two-time winner (Utah Championship and Pinnacle Bank Championship) in just 11 events. Will be 24-year-old rookie, having previously played only one PGA Tour event in both 2018 and 2019. A four-time All-Big 12 selection at OSU. Member of 2018 NCA A title team alongside Viktor Hovland and Matthew Wolff. Splits residence between Norway and Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. Viktor Hovland: The

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2018 U.S. Amateur champion and 2019 Ben Hogan Award winner at OSU. Secured his PGA Tour card by finishing in the Top 50 on the 2019 Korn Ferr y Tour official money list with $111,000 while making just two starts. By mid-September, this much-heralded, 22-year-old newcomer had posted 17 consecutive rounds in the 60s. Just as in college, consistency and composure remain his strength. Born is Oslo, Norway, he plays out of Oak Tree National and lives in Stillwater.

Matthew Wolff: Earned his PGA Tour exempt status by winning the 2019 3M Open, which came on just fourth career start and at age 20 years, two months, 23 days. In just eight starts, he finished No. 74 in the FedExCup standings, which also would have been good enough to earn exempt status this upcoming season had he not won. The 2019 NCAA medalist and Fred Haskins Award winner was a two-time first-team All-American in his two seasons at OSU. Was Palmer Cup member in 2018. Resides in Jupiter, Fla.

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

2019 OK LA HOM A GOLF H A LL OF FA ME

True Grit

Glasson overcame odds, injuries to earn spot in Oklahoma Golf Hall of Fame to pick up range balls to get privileges to hit practice balls while efore a scrawny Tiger growing up,” Carter said. “He Woods transformed his came up the hard way.”

Glasson excelled in sports, body with a highly classified training regimen particularly football, basketball and prior to Brooks Koepka climb- and track. When he blew out his ing the depth chart at linebacker, left knee playing basketball in a chronically chiseled Bill Glasson junior high and later suffered a was the most physically imposing track injury, Glasson rehabbed by playing golf more frequently. He figure on the PGA Tour.

“He was built like Atlas,” said started working at Fort WashingTom Jones, a four-time All-Ameri- ton Golf & Country Club and becan at Oklahoma State who serves gan studying the swings of better as chairman of the Oklahoma Golf players.

“My first impression of him is Hall of Fame. “There were trim and well-built players on Tour back I thought he was a surfer from then, but nobody was built like Long Beach or something,” Kane said. “He wasn’t that highly reBill.”

Longtime Oral Roberts and cruited, so I didn’t really know Tulsa golf coach Bill Brogden said who he was.”

When Brogden was prospectGlasson “was an athlete and could do about what he wanted to do. He ing future talent at ORU, Glasson looked like a defensive back. Man, was suggested as a possible recruit and Brogden paid a visit to he was strong.”

ORU athletic director Mike Fresno.

“Typical Bill, he played in a city Carter insisted Glasson “looked tournament match one day barelike Popeye with those forearms.”

College teammates Joey Rassett, footed and no shirt,” Brogden Jim Kane and Bryan Norton mar- said. “He’s playing somebody veled at Glasson’s overall athleti- who’s 35 or 40 years old, and he beat him badly.” cism.

The Titans (now Golden Ea“He was just a lot stronger than the rest of us and a determined gles) quickly became a national guy,” Norton said. “He was good at power and in 1981 had the best four-man rotation in the country everything.”

Glasson was particularly good with No. 1 Rassett, No. 2 Kane, at golf, which explains his induc- No. 3 Norton (all seniors) and No. tion into the Oklahoma Golf Hall 4 Glasson (a junior). Trouble was, of Fame as a Class of 2019 member. no other ORU player ever stepped While his future ORU team- up as the safety net at the No. 5 mates grew up as standout junior spot on the rare occasion one players, Glasson resided in Fresno, of the “Four Horsemen” scored Calif., amid modest surround- poorly.

To this day, Brogden chastises ings while living with his mother, who worked a few years with the himself for not offering a scholarstate welfare department. Glasson ship to a Minnesota high school couldn’t afford to play in summer recruit named Tom Lehman to fill that No. 5 spot. Had Lehman junior tournaments.

“Unlike most kids today, he had joined the mix, those Titans likeby john rohde

B

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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2019 OK L A HOM A GOL F H A L L OF FA M E who knows what he could have done?

Seems like he was hurt more than he was playing. And every time he came back, he picked up right where he left off and would play well.”

Rassett added on Glasson, “All those injuries didn’t hamper what he wanted to accomplish.”

Despite playing 4-on-5 all seaGlasson captured the 1997 son, the Titans occupied the No. PGA Tour Comeback Player of 1 ranking before finishing runthe Year award with a victory ner-up to Brigham Young by two at the Las Vegas Invitational, shots in the 1981 NCAA Chamtwo second-place finishes, six pionships at Stanford University top-10s and nearly $1 million in Golf Course. (ORU placed third earnings, ranking him 22nd on nationally in 1980 and sixth in that year’s money list.

1979 and 1978.)

This came 17 months after Glasson won seven times on Glasson had major surgery to the PGA Tour, where he pockhis right forearm, yet somehow eted more than $6.9 million in he still was able to lead the tour career prize money and led the in the all-around statistical catPGA Tour in driving distance as a egory, finish second in birdies, rookie in 1984. Glasson also has The Oral Roberts Titans, from left Bill Glasson, David Morthird in driving distance bewon more than $2.5 million on ris, Joey Rassett, Jim Kane, Bryan Norton, coach Bill Brogden. hind John Daly and Woods, and the PGA Champions Tour.

Glasson’s propensity for injuries that be- fourth in greens in regulation.

His first pro win came at the 1985 KemBy this stage of his career, Glasson had per Open, where Glasson trailed leader gan in his childhood would plague him his endured four knee surgeries, four sinus opLarry Mize by seven strokes with 14 holes entire career.

“Gol-ly, the guy was unbelievably tal- erations, lip surgery, tendons reattached in to play. Glasson made a 45-foot birdie putt ented,” Jones said. “Outside of his injuries, both arms, plus severe back pain that cost on the 72nd hole to win by one stroke. ly would have been NCAA kings, perhaps multiple times. Lehman desperately wanted to play at ORU, but instead remained in his home state and played for the University of Minnesota. “Yup, that’s how smart I am,” Brogden said as he mumbled in disgust.

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At the 1995 U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills, Glasson had his best career finish in a major at fourth place, trailing winner Corey Pavin, runner-up Greg Norman and some guy named Lehman, who has 35 career wins as a professional.

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

him much of the 1991 season and nearly caused him to file for permanent disability. The exact number of Glasson surgeries is unknown, but it’s in the 20-something range.

“I think he uses (all those injuries) as fuel,” Brogden said. “It’s as though he was saying, ‘I’ve had all these surgeries and I’m tough enough that I’m gonna beat you anyway.’ And I think he did that in a lot of cases.”

Many touring pros tinker with their swings when they’re completely healthy.

Glasson tinkered his way through the pain while constantly re-creating his swing.

“My movements may not be textbook,” Glasson said to Sports Illustrated in 1998, “but they’re dynamic.”

“He’s such an athlete,” Brogden said.

“You could tell him to do anything with his golf swing. Being as strong as he was, he could do anything because he went slow at it. He was not a fast golf swinger. He could make the club do what he wanted it to do.”

Brogden said he warned Glasson against heavy weightlifting, fearing it would be too taxing on his body in the long run.

Glasson has downplayed his workout regimen as a contributing factor, however.

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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2019 OKLAHOMA GOLF HALL OF FAME Glasson continues to battle injuries on the Champions Tour, but he remains committed to fitness. He and wife, Shelley, who is a personal trainer, opened the Step4ward Fitness Training Center in Stillwater in 2016.

What set Glasson apart was his relentless, competitive drive, no matter the occasion.

“We played golf with him on Thursday and played basketball on Saturday and, whoa, that’s where you saw the real competitive spirit of Bill Glasson,” Carter said.

“I think that’s why he was successful on the professional tour, because he was just going to find a way to win.”

Norton had the same experience.

“The only time I feared Bill was when we would play competitive pick-up basketball games,” Norton said. “The more competitive it got, the more I didn’t want to be guarding him. He was just a lot stronger than the rest of us and a determined guy. It’s no shock he went on to be a successful tour player because once he could focus on just one sport and get world-class instruction, he was destined. He was so mentally tough. There’s no disputing his determination.”

Rassett was the Titans’ top golfer and rou-

tinely beat Glasson in team qualifiers, but Glasson never backed down.

“He was a competitor to the bone,” Rassett said. “The beating he sometimes took from his teammates only made him better and prepared him for what he would do, and I give him a lot of credit for that. He withstood Receiving treatment for one of many ailments. Photo by Kelly Kerr it and he did it and my hat’s off to him. He showed the tenac- All that stuff.”

Brogden spent 47 years as a collegiate ity, the desire and the drive to get better.

It’s what got him to where he was. That coach and has proclaimed Glasson the Oklahoma is honoring him for this, that’s most competitive player he’s ever had.

“He wouldn’t quit on you,” Brogden awesome.”

Kane said of Glasson’s pending induc- said. “With Bill, you knew you were gettion: “I told Bill, ‘You’ve done a lot more ting all you could get. For a coach, he was than you think you’ve done. The people great to have because he would work as who are inducting you are doing it for a hard as he needed to work. That’s why he reason.’ I don’t think he knows after all was a success.”

That’s also why Glasson is a 2019 inductthese years that we still appreciate him and care for him, admire what he did on tour. ee into the Oklahoma Golf Hall of Fame.

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COMPETITION ROUNDUP

McGreevy captures second Oklahoma Open well, plus I’m playing a little better, I definitely feel like I can compete with those Max McGreevy had spent his summer guys now and excited to go back out there strolling the Great Wall of China, slipping next year.”

“It was a fun battle today. I didn’t know through crowds of demonstrators in Hong Kong and playing some very good golf on Preston had tied me up. I thought if I could the PGA Tour China.

The Edmond native and former University of Oklahoma star returned home as the leader through 10 events on the tour’s order of merit. At press time, with one event to go, he was still in that position and on the verge of earning a full exemption on to the Korn Ferry Tour for 2020.

So it was no surprise when this more mature version of McGreevy held off a backnine charge by Preston Stanley of Katy, Texas, and another by former Bedlam rival Zach Bauchou of Stillwater to win his second Oklahoma Open in the past three years.

McGreevy closed with a 5-under 65 at Oak Tree Country Club’s East Course to finish at 13-under 197, one shot ahead of Stanley, who shot a final-round 64 playing two groups ahead. Bauchou, who finished Max McGreevy his career at Oklahoma State in May, shot a 67 and finished two shots back.

McGreevy got off to a torrid start, giving himself close birdie looks on seven holes on the front nine and converting on four of them. Bauchou, playing with him in the final group, battled back with a birdie on 11 and made a great birdie on the 213-yard par-3 14th with the pin front right and just over the fronting pond. That pulled him within a shot.

Stanley, meanwhile, had eagled the par5 12th hole then birdied holes 16 and 17 to tie McGreevy at 12-under. That tie lasted just a few minutes as McGreevy stuffed his approach on the par-4 16th hole to about 7 feet above the hole and rolled in the birdie.

“Max hit a lot of great shots today, it was good to see him again and good to see him playing so well,” said Bauchou, who is gearing up both for qualifying school for the Korn Ferry Tour and also will go to qualifying school for the European Tour.

McGreevy won this event in dominant fashion in 2017, shooting 15-under in just two rounds, a year he also earned conditional status on what was then the Web. com Tour. He struggled in his first attempt on that tour, but said he is much more prepared if and when he gets a second chance.

“I don’t know if I felt like I belonged that first year,” he said. “As I’ve seen some of my roommates, teammates and friends play by ken macleod

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make pars down the stretch that 12-under would be good, so it’s a good thing that one snuck in there on 16.”

“I hit the ball about as good as I could have this week. I could have made some more putts, but I made enough. It was fun with dad (Brian) on the bag again. I’ve been over in China all year so my parents haven’t been able to watch me play, so that was nice. To get my name on that trophy again is really a great thing.”

Playing in China has been a enriching experience from both a golf and cultural standpoint. McGreevy said he hangs out with a group of about eight fellow U.S. competitors, sightseeing, sampling the food and rooming together.

“We try to get out and see something new every single week,” McGreevy said.

“We’ve been to the Great Wall and a lot of cool spots and have some more lined up for these last couple of weeks. It’s been a joy playing there so far. The courses have been really good. Unfortunately the government doesn’t really like golf, so getting the schedule has been tough, but the PGA Tour does a great job running the events.”

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COMPETITION ROUNDUP McGreevy earned a $10,000 first-place check out of a total purse of over $64,000.

The low amateur was Dustin Hasley of Tulsa, who plays for Oral Roberts University. He shot 4-under 206.

Kyle Hudelson

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Hudelson wins OGA Mid-Amateur Drive for show, chip and putt for dough, or in this case, the Oklahoma Golf Association Mid-Amateur Championship.

Kyle Hudelson hit just seven greens in regulation in his opening round of 3-under 69, but got up-and-down from everywhere, took advantage of the par-5s to card four birdies and didn’t miss a putt inside 5 feet.

The former Oklahoma Christian golfer (2008-13) followed it up with an evenpar 72 at Twin Hills Country Club wto shoot 141, three shots clear of Tyler Trout of Oklahoma City (73-71) and four ahead of a trio that included Rhett Bolen of Edmond (73-72), Eric Fox of Weatherford (75-70) and Peter Vitali of Oklahoma City (74-71).

Hudelson, 31, is now a property and casualty specialist for NFP Property and Casualty of Oklahoma City. This was his fourth OGA event since returning from a

three-year stint in San Francisco, and first state championship since his Deer Creek high school team won the state in 2007.

He and Clark Collier made it to the final match of the 2017 USGA Four-Ball Championship.

“The course was playing tough with long rough and I didn’t hit it particularly well,” Hudelson said. “But my up-anddown game was really good. The fairways are tight and the greens are small, so I just stayed patient. I was able to take advantage of some of the par-5s (making birdies on 13 and 16 in both rounds) and that really helped me.”

After his short game wizardry on Wednesday, Hudelson chipped in twice Thursday, including on the difficult 18th hole. He knew he had a three-shot cushion to start the hole, but that was looking a bit perilous after flubbing his third shot before ending it with the chipin.

“That was a fun way to cap it off,” he said while celebrating the victory with family and friends at his home course Gaillardia Country Club. “I just tried to keep everything in front of me today and didn’t have to do anything crazy.”

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DEST INATIONS

Hitting the slopes in

Northern Michigan

Arthur Hills, hole 3. by tom bedell

I

t might be right up there with the sale of Manhattan for $24. In 1947, Everett Kircher ran a Studebaker showroom in Detroit, when he wasn’t running off to Sun Valley, Idaho, to satisfy his passion for skiing. In those days, that wasn’t a short trip.

Kircher figured there must be an easier way, and he and two partners started scouting the Michigan hills for a plausible site to build a ski resort. When they finally settled on 40 acres in the northern highlands of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula, the owner, a state senator named William Pearson, was so bemused by the notion he sold the trio the land for $1.

Kircher died in 2002 at 85. His company, Boyne Resorts, now run by his son, Stephen, took in about $400 million in revenues last year and employs some 10,500 in its 11 resort properties, which includes nine ski areas and 13 golf courses in the United States and Canada. They now own a lot more than 40 acres.

Headquarters are still in Michigan, where there are three Boyne resorts, and it’s the mother lode for the company’s golf holdings. Pretty good for an afterthought that the late Kircher came up with over a beer with a friend, Bill Harber, in the mid50’s.

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son ended and the Boyne Mountain resort turned into a ghost town. Harber suggested adding a golf course. The pair promptly, after another beer, went out and staked out a nine-hole executive course using bamboo slalom poles.

When it came time to get serious with a full-length course for the Boyne Highlands resort it was Harber, again, who suggested Kircher hire the best-known course designer of the day, Robert Trent Jones Sr. So it came to be. The Heather course opened in 1966 and is often credited as one of the catalysts for the northern Michigan golf boom. It certainly energized the Boyne company — and kept the staff on hand year-round.

One tag line for the company is “Ten Courses. Three Resorts. One Destination.”

To wit: The Alpine and The Monument courses at Boyne Mountain in Boyne Falls; The Heather, the Arthur Hills, the Donald Ross Memorial and The Moor courses at Boyne Highlands in Harbor Springs; Crooked Tree Golf Club, and the Links, Preserve and Quarry courses at the Inn at Bar Harbor, all within 45 minutes of one another.

The counting is a little creative with the latter, as the trio at Bar Harbor are three distinct nine-hole routings. They are arguably the jewel in the crown, though the company’s very first course, The Heather, has lost none of its luster over the years.

In 2018, it was named the Michigan Golf

Course of the Year and this year copped the National Golf Course Owner’s Association Course of the Year award, as well as making the Golf Digest’s list of America’s 100 Greatest Public Courses.

Making the Rounds In late June, I visited the Boyne Michigan resorts in cahoots with a cadre of other golf writers. If there was little extra time to try, say, the zip line at Boyne Highlands, or the plethora of other outdoor activities at the various resorts, we did manage to play 60% of the Boyne courses, gorged at a multitude of the resorts’ dining options and dipped into some of the community charms of nearby Petoskey, about 10 minutes from the Inn at Bay Harbor.

Besides Jones, the courses were designed

by Arthur Hills and William Newcomb, as well as the ghost of Donald Ross. Bernie Friedrich, the first golf pro at Boyne and, 44 years later, the senior vice-president of golf operations and resort sales, said, “Everett Kircher had a vision that we’d have a Donald Ross course made of replica holes from his courses that people wouldn’t normally have an opportunity to play.”

Friedrich, Jim Flick (then the chief instructor at the resorts) and well-known Michigan golf designer Newcomb hit the road in the United States and abroad in search of Ross holes that might reasonably adapt to the Boyne terrain.

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DEST INATIONS in development,” said Friedrich, just inducted this year into the Michigan Golf Hall of Fame (joining Kircher). “We must have looked at 600 or 700 holes over the years.”

Newcomb eventually put it all together, and the Donald Ross Memorial course will give players a taste of holes from Seminole, Oakland Hills, Royal Dornoch, Pinehurst No. 2, and other Ross greatest hits. Having played five of the actual holes represented, I can’t say they rang any of my memory bells, but the course is an enjoyable and organic amalgam in any case.

Newcomb, who worked for a time with Pete Dye and coached the University of Michigan golf team for a decade, also designed The Moor, Monument and Alpine courses for Boyne.

Hills is well represented by his namesake course at Boyne Highlands, a re-do of the Crooked Tree course (originally a Harry Bowers design) and the three nines at Bay Harbor.

The Inn at Bay Harbor is simply a beautiful sight to behold on the wide shore of Lake Michigan’s Little Traverse Bay, the gleaming Victorian style cottages and the main inn putting a modern spin on grand

Boyne Highlands Falls, Main Lodge summer resorts from bygone eras.

Hills did put a unique stamp on the aptly named nines of the Bay Harbor courses.

The Links indeed hugs the shoreline on many holes, running out and back along bluffs overlooking Lake Michigan. The Quarry plays around the rocky formations of a former shale mine. And the Preserve is the most naturally wooded of the trio.

Players can go around in three ways: Quarry/Preserve, Preserve/Links or Links/ Quarry, the latter the most requested.

They’re the more dramatic nines, to be

124 N Peoria Ave Tulsa, OK 74120 918.832.5544

www.jonesplan.com

BUILDER

sure, beautiful but testing—from the 6,427-yard tee markers the slope rating is a daunting 143.

Jerry Roman, who used to work at Bay Harbor but was recently installed as the head pro at the Boyne-run Sunday River course in Maine, said the Preserve was actually the pros’ favorite. Although he admitted that was partially because that was the course they could sneak out to take their cuts on when business slackened late in the day.

Look at the Boyne website and you can find a hefty list of pros and instructors at the various courses, all of them asked which was their favorite Boyne course.

Other than Friedrich, who diplomatically answers, “All,” the vast majority of them choose The Heather. (The Alpine a clear but distant runner-up.)

I might lean to Bay Harbor, but why quibble when you get to play them both? But clearly the Jones course has stood the test of time well for a more than 50-year-old course.

It’s had some length added over the years, but the original design stands as it was.

Well, except perhaps for the 18th hole.

When Jones finished the routing, Kircher wanted something more dramatic for the par-4 finish. Like, say, a second shot that, after about a 250-yard drive requires an 180- to 200-yard carry across a 140-yard pond to reach the green.

“Everett was a bit of an engineer,” said Friedrich. “You can always tell an engineer.

But not much. There was no question as to who was going to win that design tussle.

The pond is there today in all its forbidding glory. There is a safer layup route to the left of the pond. But you didn’t come to northern Michigan to lay up, did you?

Tom Bedell somehow managed to graduate from Kalamazoo College. He’s always happy to return to Michigan.

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GOL F FI TN E SS

Master these moves before you start training for golf speed and power Clint Howard Golf Fitness Systems

I work with hundreds of golfers and one thing I know for sure is…. pretty much every golfer wants to be able to hit

the ball farther.

This ultimately means golfers want more speed and power to generate more clubhead speed. So knowing this, golfers in today’s world understand that means they need to start working out and training for speed and power. You might think this means exercises like explosive jumps, throws, sprints, power slams, and Olympic lifts.

It’s true, these all can be great exercises when used safely and properly, at the right time, with the right dosage and progressions.

All of these types of exercises are proven to increase speed and power, and they are also fun to do (when done correctly) and you look pretty cool and feel empowered when doing them.

So what’s the problem then, right?

The problem is that these are advanced exercises and should be used only when you are physically ready for them and able to do them with proper form and technique, and not have high risk of getting injured. Too often, golfers and all athletes start doing advanced movements and exercises before they are truly physically ready to be doing them.

Jumps, sprints, and explosive type exercises have very high force output and neural demands on the body. If they aren’t done properly with great form, they can create inefficient/ faulty neuromuscular firing and movement patterns that can potentially limit progress, as well as lead to injury.

Again, these type of exercises are great and I use all of them every day with golfers I train, but you must first develop the right physical abilities and movement patterns to ensure effective and safe progressions.

Here’s a solid checklist of what you need to do to get prepared and develop the proper

movement patterns: • Ability to stabilize your core • Good rotational mechanics • Lumbo-pelvic control • Rotary stability • Hip stability • Sufficient eccentric strength So, how do you develop all of these qualities?

Here are three starting exercises that pretty much cover it all. Start doing these exercises regularly and get good at them. Then you’ll earn the right to progress to the more advanced speed and power work.

Bird Dogs Bird dogs are great for teaching core control and stability, rotary stability, spinal alignment/postural control, shoulder stability, hip alignment, shoulder mobility and spinal stabilization. These are key in helping develop speed and power in a safe efficient manner. While maintaining a neutral spine, kneel on the floor in a quadruped position with your knees under your hips and your hands under your shoulders. Raise your opposite arm and leg straight out, keeping your abs braced, stomach in and your whole body

in one straight line from head to foot. The goal is to resist rotation and extension forces that attempt to destabilize your spine. Do 1-2 sets of 10 reps on each side.

Quadruped Reach Backs This exercise is great for teaching proper rotational mechanics and improving thoracic extension. The quadruped position makes it easy to practice rotating from the thoracic spine (mid back), while keeping the hips and lumbar spine stable. Start in a quadruped positions with hips under knees and wrists under shoul44

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GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

I NST RUC T ION

Tour wedge play; spin it like the pros

Ryan Rody

One of the most common questions I’m asked by amateur golfers is, “Can you teach me how to spin it like

the pros?”

1 Some of us do not have the physical capabilities to hit the ball 300-plus yards, but almost all of us can hit a 50-yard wedge shot.

We want to create a setup and a swing that will allow us to: • Make solid contact, ball first and turf in front • Flight the ball down, and most likely lower than you think • Have a draw or hook curve to it in the air I am using my Callaway 60 degree PM, but you can use anywhere from a 52 degree to a 60 degree.

1) Setup – Place the ball back of center with your weight slightly forward and towards the balls of your feet. This will help the shaft lean slightly forward at address. Feet shoulder width apart.

2) Backswing -- 3/4 backswing and keeping the pressure on your lead side as your turn.

3) Downswing -- Now I am going to feel

2

3

5

like I am going to drive the ball down into the ground from an inside path.

Leading the handle and closing the clubface slightly. Notice I have begun to 1a 4a turn around my 5) Finish – Finish with left leg in my downswing.

2a your arms around your The noodle is placed over an alignement rod at about a 60-degree angle and I body with your hands about shoulder height.

I hope this helps you improve your wedge have the ball on the outside edge to ensure play and shoot lower scores. the club delivers from the inside.

4) Contact – To help ensure you are strikRyan Rody, PGA ing ball first, place a tee in the ground slightly Director of Instruction ahead of the ball. Then strike the ball while Southern Hills Country Club driving the tee out of the ground.

ders. Place right hand over the right ear. The eccentric strength is important for good Make sure the neck is not flexed and in line landing mechanics, force absorption, decelwith the rest of the body and make sure eration ability, and overall helping to stay the shoulders are not rounded. Rotate your injury free. Step one foot back, placing you in a tall lunge position. Front rib cage around the shoulKyle Ingram, PGA foot is planted firmly on the der that is stabilizing on Golf Professional/ ground actively pressing into the ground. Ensure that the Lit’l Links Golf the floor. The back foot is hips stay neutral and are not Club performing dorsiflexed and planted firmswaying back and forth or split squat. ly in place. Flexing at the hip latterly. Take big breaths and and knee of the front leg, decontrolled movement is key scend down to the floor until with this exercise in order to the knee of the back leg alavoid using other joints to most comes in contact with rotate. Do 1-2 sets of 10 reps the floor. Place a 4-5 second each side. time emphasis on this part of the movement (eccentric) Goblet Split Squat with to achieve the desired training effect. Then Eccentric Lowering The split stance position works on our extend at the knee and hip of the front leg balance by narrowing the base of support to return to the starting position at normal and gives us good hip stability demands. speed. Do 1-2 sets of 4-8 reps each side, with When squatting we must stabilize our knees the accentuated eccentric focus on each rep in a different plane of motion from the one before switching to the other leg.

Again, the overall theme here is to not we’re squatting in (frontal & sagittal plane).

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

4

rush into speed and power training exercises if you’re not ready for them yet. Take your time and train smart and do things safe and properly and you’ll get there.

I normally recommend consulting with a golf fitness professional to work with and/ or to help design a program specific to your needs and goals and current fitness level.

You always want to make sure you’re doing everything safely and effectively with proper form and technique. Now go make it happen and unleash your swing.

Clint Howard is the Owner/Director of Golf Fitness Systems and is recognized as one of the Top 50 Golf Fitness Professionals in the country

by Golf Digest. PGA Tour Pros, Oklahoma State Men’s and Women’s golf, University of Tulsa golf, and many other collegiate and high school golfers, world long drive champions, and golfers of all levels go to Clint and Golf Fitness Systems to improve their body, and their game. To learn more, call 918-296-7418 or go to www.GolfFitnessSystems.com W W W.GOLFOKL AHOMA.ORG

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SCH E DU L E S & R E SU LTS : More at w w w.gol fok la homa.org OKLA. GOLF ASSOCIATION MID-AMATEUR AT TWIN HILLS G&CC, OKLA. CITY (PAR-72) SEPT. 4-5 Team scores: 1, Kyle Hudelson 69-72 – 141; 2, Tyler Trout 73-71 – 144; 3 (tie), Eric Fox 75-70 – 145, Rhett Bolen 73-72 -- 145 and Peter Vitali 74-71 – 145; 6 (tie), Blake Gibson 74-72 – 146 and Gerod Black 72-74 – 146; 8 (tie), Jay Smith 72-75 – 147 and Dillon Jordan 72-75 – 147; 10, Brandon Weeden 74-74 – 148; 11 (tie), TJ Eckert 75-74 – 149 and Blake Garland 74-75 – 149; 13, Austin Hannah 79-71 – 150, JR Hurley 74-76 – 150 and Michael Gotcher 76-74 – 150.

OKLAHOMA OPEN AT OAK TREE CC (EAST), EDMOND (PAR-70) AUG. 22-24 Team scores: 1, Max McGreevy 67-65-65 – 197; 2, Preston Stanley 68-66-64 – 198; 3, Zach Bauchou 64-68-67 – 199; 4, Mason Horner 66-70-65 – 201; 5, Cyril Bouniol 67-67-68 – 202; 6, Fred Wedel 65-66-72 – 203; 7 (tie), Nick Arman 71-67-66 204, Andrew Hudson 66-68-70 – 204 and Zander Lozano 65-68-71 – 204; 10 (tie), Hayden Wood 65-70-70 – 205, Sean Romero 63-70-72 – 205 and Zach James 71-67-67 – 205; 13 (tie), a-Dustin Hasley 68-6870 – 206, Kalena Preus 68-69-69 – 206, Blake Trimble 68-69-69 – 206 and Joel Thelen 7167-68 – 206; 17 (tie), Brendon Jelley 72-68-67 – 207, Trent Whitekiller 67-69-71 – 207, Mikel Martinson 70-69-68 – 207 and Rylee Reinertson 71-67-69 – 207.

OKLA. JUNIOR GOLF TOUR MUSKOGEE FALL CLASSIC AT MUSKOGEE CC (PAR-71) SEPT. 28-29 BOYS 15-18 1, William Falleur 72-67 – 139; 2, Davis Cooper 68-72 – 140; 3 (tie), Logan Brooks 70-71 – 141 and Dylan Teeter 72-69 – 141; 5 (tie), Ian McCrary 71-72 – 143 and Phister Phillips 72-71 – 143; 7, Samuel Tandy 73-71 – 144; 8, Murphy Allard 74-71 – 145; 9 (tie), Jesse Rouse 71-76 – 147 and Ben Thionnet 72-75 – 147; 10 (tie), Kaden Armstrong 75-73 – 148, Tres Hill 79-69 – 148, Gabe Replogle 78-70 – 148 and Michaell Senn III 75-73 – 148.

BOYS 12-14 1, Sam Morris 73-77 – 150 (won playoff); 2, CJ Phillips 78-72 – 150; 3, Jesse Tandoy 76-75 – 151; 4, Daniel Littlefield 72-83 – 155; 5 (tie), Ben Campbell 75-82 – 157 and Bo Gentry 76-81 – 157.

GIRLS 1, Jenni Roller 81-71—152; 2, Reagan Chaney 78-75 – 153; 3, Jordan Clayborn 79-77 – 156; 4, Raychel Nelke 78-78 – 156; 5 (tie), Brooklyn Benn 82-78 – 160 and Rylee Roberts 82-78 – 160; 7, Adrian Piles 83-81 –- 164; 8, Lily Stanton 76-90 – 166; 9, Morgan Landes 83-84 – 167; 10, Layne Ailshie 83-85 – 168.

BEST OF THE WEST CLASSIC AT LINCOLN PARK GC (WEST), OKLA. CITY (PAR-71) SEPT. 21-22 BOYS 15-18 1, Kameron Shaw 69-70 – 139 (won playoff); 2, Tate Herrenbruck 75-64 – 139; 3, Charlie Jackson 72-68 – 140; 4 (tie), Bo Robbins 68-73 – 141 and Eric Schuessler 72-69 – 141; 6, Jordan Wilson 72-70 – 142; 7 (tie), Benjamin Stoller 73-70 – 143 and Brett Wilcoxen 70-73 – 143; 9, Bosten Benn 73-72 – 145; 10 (tie), Kaden Armstrong 7373 – 146, Gabe Replogle 70-76 – 146 and Ben Thionnet 74-72 – 146.

BOYS 12-14 1, Sam Morris 76-75 – 151; 2, William Hennessee 75-77 – 152; 3 (tie), Kolby Legg 74-78 – 152 and CJ Phillips 74-78 – 152.

GIRLS 1, Reagan Chaney 76-79 – 155 (won playoff); 2 (tie), Kate Tilma 78-77 – 155 a==nd Lilly Whitley 78-77 – 155; 4, Brooklyn Benn 80-77 – 157; 5, Emily Miller 81-77 – 158; 6, Ramsey Gunter 8080 – 160; 7, Sarah Sherrard 87-74 – 161; 8, Gracie Doke 82-80 – 162; 9, Jenna Triplett 87-81 – 168; 10, Nyah Sanders 85-84 – 169.

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LAKE HEFNER SHOOTOUT AT LAKE HEFNER GC (NORTH), OKC (PAR-72) SEPT. 14-15 BOYS 15-18 1, Jake Hopper 68-65 – 133; 2, James Roller 68-67 – 135; 3, Andrew Goodman 71-65 – 136; 4, Jaxon Dowell 71-67 – 138; 5, Bosten Benn 71-69 – 140; 6 (tie), Phisher Phillips 71-70 – 141, Kameron Shaw 74-67 – 141, Benjamin Stoller 68-73 – 141 and Buddy Wehrli 74-67 – 141; 10 (tie), Tres Hill 68-74 – 142 and Ian McCrary 72-70 – 142.

BOYS 12-14 1, Parker Payne 74-70 – 144; 2, Evan Weaver 7776 – 153; 3, Bo Gentry 79-75 – 154; 4, CJ Phillips 79-77 – 156; 5, Hunter Baumann 88-77 – 165.

GIRLS 1, Raychel Nelke 74-67 – 141; 2, Kate Tilma 7172 – 143; 3 (tie), Maddi Kamas 76-68 – 144 and Olivia Colt 73-71 – 144; 5, Emily Miller 75-71 – 146; 6, Gracie Doke 83-77 – 160; 7, Carrie Hutchings 77-85 – 162; 8 (tie), Laynee Miller 76-90 – 166 and Lindyn Ross 86-80 – 166; 10 (tie), Meghan Charles 83-86 – 169 and Mimi Hoang 85-84 – 169.

BATTLE OF BROKEN ARROW AT THE CLUB AT INDIAN SPRINGS SEPT. 7-8 BOYS 15-18 1, James Roller 68-69 – 137; 2, Benjamin Stoller 72-67 – 139; 3, Logan Brooks 71-71 – 142; 4, Jeremy Tandoy 73-70 – 143; 5 (tie), Carson Wright 74-70 – 144, Brayden Strickland 71-73 – 144 and Murphy Allard 77-67 – 144; 7, Ryder Cowan 7768 – 145; 8 (tie), Brent Wilcoxen 72-74 – 146 and Ben Thionnet 74-72 – 146; 10, Michael Senn 7473 – 147; 11 (tie), Alexander Apolskis 75-73 – 148 and Dylan Teeter 74-74 – 148.

Boys 12-14 1, William Hennessee 75-75 – 150; 2, Evan Weaver 77-74 – 151; 3, Kolby Legg 72-80 – 152; 4, Ty Adkins 80-75 – 155.

GIRLS 1, Jenni Roller 78-74 – 152; 2, Lily Stanton 82-78 – 160; 3, Hanna Hawks 82-79 – 161; 4, Lauren Pleiman 80-83 – 163; 5 (tie), Lindyn Ross 89-76 – 165 and Nyah Sanders 86-79 – 165; 7, Adrian Piles 8187 – 168; 8, Gracie Doke 86-85 – 171; 9, Meghan Charles 88-84 – 172; 10 (tie), Jordan Clayborn 85-87 – 172 and Anna Ziegler 86-86 – 172.

JOHN CONRAD LABOR DAY CLASSIC AT JOHN CONRAD GC, OKLA, CITY (PAR-72) SEPT. 1-2 BOYS 15-18 1, Charlie Jackson 71-65 – 136; 2, Craig Sanders 70-67 – 137; 3, Kameron Shaw 68-70 – 138; 4, Evan Johnson 68-71 – 139; 5, Logan Brooks 70-70 – 140; 6 (tie), Ian McCrary 74-67 – 141 and Bo Robbins 66-75 – 141; 7 (tie), Sutton McMillan 72-70 – 142 and James Roller 70-72 – 142; 9, Dominic Stevens 74-69 – 143; 10, Jeremy Tandoy 71-73 – 144; 11, Adam Kasitz 73-72 – 145.

Boys 12-14 1, Asher Whitaker 70-78 – 148; 2, Evan Weaver 79-72 – 151; 3, Sam Morris 77-76 – 153; 4, Conner Geist 78-78 – 156.

GIRLS 1, Maddi Kamas 71-67 – 138; 2, Lilly Whitley 71-73 – 144; 3, Kate Tilma 73-77 – 150; 4, Emily Miller 78-74 – 152; 5, Reagan Chaney 79-74 – 153; 6, Alli Riddle 81-74 – 155; 7, Lindyn Ross 81-75 – 156; 8, Carrie Hutchings 78-79 – 157; 9, Nyah Sanders 82-77 – 159; 10, Lily Stanton 83-77 – 160; 11, Gracie Doke 82-79 – 161.

TULSA GOLF ASSOCIATION PAR-3 CHALLENGE AT LAFORTUNE PARK GC SEPT. 9 1, Jeffrey Cox/Brent Stone 44; 2, Barry Walters/ John Shackelford 46; 3 (tie), Richard Hunt/Tyler Hunt and Richard Townley/Riggs Roy 47; 4 (tie), Jock Lucas/Burch Williams 48.

SOUTH CENTRAL PGA JUSTICE GOLF CAR PRO-ASSISTANT AT OAK TREE CC, EDMOND SEPT. 3 1, Kurt Gibson/Riley Seitz (Reflection Ridge) 64-31 – 95 ($1,100); 2 (tie), Lance Allen/Brent Williamson (Forest Ridge) 64-33 – 97 and Tim Mendenhall/David Rogers (Oakwood) 65-32 – 97 ($800); 4 (tie), Kyle Flinton/Jett Johnson (Quail

Creek) 68-30 – 98, JJ Belcoff/Brent Williamson (Forest Ridge) 65-33 – 98, Kyle Ingram/Amber Duke (Lit’l Links) 65-33 – 98 and Tim Fleming/ Shannon Friday (OKC G&CC) 67-31 – 98 ($525); 8 (tie), Cary Cozby/Daniel Byrd (Southern Hills) 68-31 – 99, Garrett Diel/Seth Bryan (Gaillardia) 63-36 – 99 and Jarod Lundy/Jay Lee (Winter Creek) 67-32 – 99 ($380).

YAMAHA TEAM CHAMPIONSHIP AT WINSTAR RESORT, THACKERVILLE AUG. 27 1, Jeff Tucker/Mark Fuller (Surrey Hills) 62-33 – 95; 2, Seth Bryan (Gaillardia)/Ryan Rody (Southern Hills) 63-33 – 96; 3 (tie), Brent Cryer (GC of Edmond)/Kyley Tetley (Indian Springs) 59-38 – 97, Jim Young (River Oaks/Trent Rommann (Crestview) 65-32 – 97 and Rusty Wortham (Altus AFB/Windy Trails)/Mark Ramer (Golf World Driving Range) 60-37 – 97; 6 (tie), Lance Allen/ Brent Williamson (Forest Ridge) 65-34 – 99, Tim Graves (Rose Creek)/Vince Bizik 63-36 – 99 and Cary Cozby (Southern Hills)/Tim Fleming (OKC G&CC) 64-35 – 99; 9 (tie), Tory Hayes (South Central Section)/Brent Wilcoxen (South Lakes) 67-35 – 102 and Steve Carson (Lincoln Park)/ Shannon Friday (OKC G&CC) 65-37 – 102.

WOMEN’S OKLA. GOLF ASSOCIATION FOUR-BALL PARTNERSHIP AT SHANGRI-LA GC, MONKEY ISLAND AUG. 19-20 Overall low gross: 1, Jill Johnson/Janet Miller 70-73 – 143; 2, Teresa Delarzalere/Rebecca Davis 70-74 – 144; 3, Robin Purdue/Patty Coatney 7677 – 153; 4, Nan Dyer/Chris Thomas 75-80 – 155; 5, Deborah McClain/Pam Bonifield 78-78 – 156.

COLLEGES MEN U.C. FERGUSON CLASSIC AT LINCOLN PARK GC, OKLA. CITY (PAR-71) SEPT. 3-4 Team scores: 1, Okla. City 284-273-285 – 842; 2, Bellevue 281-284-283 – 848; 3, Central Baptist 288-292-283 – 848; 4, Grand View 288-293-293 – 874; 5, SW Christian 297-292-290 – 879; 6, Baker 290-293-306 – 889; 7, Kansas Wesleyan 303-296-293 – 892; 8, Okla. Wesleyan 299-296309 – 904; 9, Central Christian 315-309-302 – 926; 10, Panhandle State 307-301-322 – 930; 11, Sterling 315-315-329 – 959.

Individual leaders: 1, Emiel Van Geet (SW Christian) 71-66-68 – 205; 2, Peri’Don Castille (OCU) 70-69-67 – 206; 3, Andre Becerra (Bellevue) 68-70-69 – 207; 4 (tie), Carson Seals (OCU) 69-71-69 – 209 and Bodey Jackson (CB) 71-6969 – 209; 6, Floris-Jan Ooseterhof (Bellevue) 71-71-68 – 210; 7, Santiago Chamorro (OCU) 71-70-71 – 212.

WOMEN SCHOONER FALL CLASSIC AT BELMAR GC, NORMAN (PAR-70) SEPT. 28-29 Team scores: 1, Texas 283-275-280 – 838; 2, Alabama 284-282-281 – 847; 3, Mississippi State 287-284-277 – 848; 4, Baylor 295-275-279 – 849; 5 (tie), Florida State 289-284-277 – 850 and Illinois 290-278-282 – 850; 7, Oklahoma 282-275-296 – 853; 8, Houston 290-282-284 – 856; 9, Clemson 294-281-284 – 859; 10, Texas A&M 295-286-283 – 864; 11, Miami 298-285284 – 867; 12 (tie), TCU 296-292-280 – 868 and Louisville 290-286-292 – 868; 14, Notre Dame 301-281-287 – 869; 15, Texas State 296-287-295 – 878.

Individual leaders: 1 (tie), Tristyn Nowlin (Ill.) 69-71-67 – 207 and Frida Kinhut (FSU) 69-6771 – 207; 3 (tie), Ashley Gilliam (MSU) 72-71-65 – 208, Gurleen Kaur (Baylor) 72-66-70 – 208, Kaitlyn Papp (Texas) 72-66-70 – 208 and Bianca Fernandez Garcia-Poggio (Texas A&M 7266-70 – 208; Mikhaela Fortuna (OU) 68-67-74 – 209, Abby Heck (Notre Dame) 72-71-66 – 209 and Elodie Chapelet (Baylor) 74-66-69 – 209; 10 (tie), Kaitlin Milligan (OU) 67-70-73 – 210, Clara Moyano (MSU) 66-71-73 – Other OU scores: Hannah Lee 71-69-77 – 217, Sydney Youngblood 75-69-74 – 218, Libby Winans 76-69-75 – 220.

GOLF OKL AHOMA • OCTOBER /NOVEMBER 2019

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