Mature student graduates with second honours

Two years older and wiser, Keith Nolan is ready for a second chance on the US Tour. He feels he deserves it. The tour's qualifying school is known as a "torture chamber" among seasoned professionals, but the 26-year-old Irishman - who secured his playing privileges for 2000 on Monday after six strained days at the Doral Resort's Gold and Silver courses - has survived it. Not once, but twice.

Yesterday, Nolan was back in Knoxville, Tennessee, and contemplating the future. Things have changed since Nolan first won his tour card at the 1997 school. Last March, he married Yolanda, a fellow-graduate of East Tennessee State University, and that, he believes, is part of the maturing process that will make him a better player. But he also has two years as a professional behind him, two years that have shown him how tough life can be as a struggling golfer.

"I'm a better player now," said Nolan. "When I played on the tour last year (1998) I went from being one of the better amateurs, a very reasonable college player, to someone who didn't get to play much at the weekend. I had to try and stay upbeat, but it was hard when you were missing so many cuts."

Indeed, Nolan endured a miserable rookie year on the circuit and lost his playing rights for the season just finished. Instead, he played the Nike Tour as an non-exempt member. Rather than make the 30-minute flight from Knoxville to Atlanta for a connecting flight, he was reduced to driving everywhere. He played 25 tournaments, earned $45,930 in prize-money and finished 62nd on the Order of Merit. A return to tour school was the only option if he wanted to chase his dream.

But others have endured similar toil. In John Feinstein's award-winning book A Good Walk Spoiled, Paul Azinger recalls how he lost his card in 1982 and then flunked tour school. It forced him to spend a year on the mini-tours where he drove around in a motor home. "I didn't really believe I was good enough my first year on tour, and I played that way," recalled Azinger. The year spent on the secondary tour toughened him up, and Nolan feels the same way.

"It's a dream to get my card back, but next year is also going to be a terrific challenge for me. I'm not setting any specific targets. I just want to go out and take it one round at a time, which is pretty much what I have been doing in recent months," said Nolan.

"The school is torture in some ways, but it all depends on what way you look at it. I looked on it as a challenge. I'm a lot tougher mentally, and that's important. In a way, the past few days reminded me of how it felt when I played in the Walker Cup or international golf for Ireland, only more extreme. But you learn from playing in tournaments and you have to put what you learn into practice."

Fortunately for Nolan, his wife was with him in Florida for the first five days of the Q-school, but Yolanda missed the final day's play because she had to return home to work.

Nolan had set himself up with a 63 in the first round - "It was a dream start, but in its own way it put a little extra pressure on because I had to go out and follow up," he confessed - and knew that a solid final round would be sufficient.

In the event, he faced into the notorious 18th hole, which demands a precision drive and then an equally precise approach to an island green, knowing that he would have his tour card if he avoided a disaster.

"I'd done a Parnevik on it and didn't look at any scoreboards all the way around," he said. "I had suffered a double-bogey on that 18th hole on Saturday and that crosses your mind, no matter how hard you try to keep it out."

In the event, he "piped" a drive, found the middle of the green with his approach and the birdie putt just lipped out. It didn't matter. He was comfortably inside the qualifying requirements.

Back home in Bray, his parents, Peter and Joan, got a telephone call from a friend in Los Angeles who was watching Nolan's achievement on the Golf Channel. By putting the phone up to the television set, the family could hear their son being interviewed by the media.

Nolan, though, had entered the tour school in a healthy frame of mind. For one thing, he had a caddie he could trust - Jeff Deane, who'd been with him for the previous eight weeks - and a new set of Ping blades. His form in the final few weeks of the Nike Tour had also been encouraging, with two top-10 finishes in his final four events. Also, he had made the cut in his last seven tournaments.

Nolan believes he has what it takes to succeed with the big boys, and knows what to expect in 2000. The statistics would appear to back up his confidence. Not known as one of the longest hitters in the game, he is nevertheless an accurate one. But the most telling statistic of all relates to his putting. On the Nike Tour this season, Nolan finished fourth in putting averages. Even more impressively, he finished first in birdies on par fours. The man who is sponsored on the US Tour by Irish pub company Fado is intent on making a big impact next year, but he doesn't see himself playing in the United States alone.

"I was disappointed I wasn't able to play in the Irish Open this year, but I had committed myself to the Nike Tour. Next year, however, I would love to play in the Irish Open at Ballybunion. It is something that would mean a lot to me."