BOOK OF THE DAY: FEARGAL QUINNreviews Shooting For TigerBy William Echikson Public Affairs 269pp, $24.95
‘DON’T PUT your daughter on the stage Mrs Worthington” were the words of a Noel Coward music- hall song. Substitute golf course for music hall and then read Shooting for Tiger.
The book is full of anecdotes about young golfers and the influence that golf has had on their lives. It’s a book about young American golfers but could well apply here too. The real meat is in the behaviour of parents who dote on their offspring and devote time and money in the hope of producing another Tiger Woods.
It’s interesting to learn that most children competing in top- level golf pick up their first club when they are five or six and in most cases start playing in tournaments by the age of eight.
However, golf is unpredictable and, while Tiger Woods is the exception, his success acts as the magnet to attract youngsters to devote their lives to a sport which could end up as an obsession – or a joy.
It is understandable that American youngsters who have a capability for the game can become so focused. Some have to put up with parents who prepare them for stardom – and it can cost up to $100,000 a year to put a teenager through what is felt necessary to reach the professional circuit. Clearly some are willing to pay that.
However, one parent worries about the seriousness of the junior golf process. “They don’t laugh and they don’t chat,” she says, “they just play.”
There are exceptions, though. One of those young golfers, Morgan Pressel, played at the AIB Ladies Irish Open in Portmarnock last year. She was a wonderful golfer who appeared to enjoy the game and handled the large crowds who followed her without pressure. Echikson writes: “Even thought they have won millions of dollars, Craemer [another young star] and Pressel appear to be giggly teenagers rather than mature superstar athletes.”
Success is a very attractive goal for these young people. In 1997, my wife, our son Donal and I were teamed up with Australian Karrie Webb (then 19) in the Pro Am before the Ladies Irish Open in St Margaret’s. She told us it was her first professional tournament and that if she won a major, she would get exemption from qualifying for 10 years.
She did not do well in St Margaret’s but a couple of weeks later, she won the British Women’s Open for her 10-year exemption and later became the first woman to win €1 million in one year – Karrie obviously benefited from playing with me!
The big decision for these young golfers is whether they join the professional ranks at an early age, as Tiger did, or accept a golf sponsorship for university. Cody Gribble is a typical star on the junior circuit. Although only 16, Cody has already committed himself to the University of Texas.
University is a very attractive stepping-stone. Millionaire T Boone Pickens made a record- breaking $165 million donation to the athletic department of Oklahoma State University in 2006 and since then, its university golfers travel by private jet to tournaments and enjoy food prepared by a special chef.
While this book is about young golfers, it could just as easily apply to swimmers or tennis players who reach the top of their sports at an early age.
Their parents run the risk of creating little monsters who lose their teenage years to an unachievable goal. But then again there is sufficient evidence that youthful sports enthusiasts do not succumb to obesity, drug-taking and alcohol.
Feargal Quinn is a member of Seanad Éireann and author of Crowning the Customer.