Hnatiuk won’t tee it up, but still has eye on ball

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 14/07/2009 (6260 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

IT’S now nearly four seasons since Glen Hnatiuk played full-time professional tour golf.

Despite an elbow injury that will keep him out of the Canadian Tour’s Players Cup this week at Pine Ridge, the 44-year-old from Selkirk hasn’t taken his eye off the ball.

“Golf’s not dead for me,” Hnatiuk said Monday after finishing the show at the Investors Group Glen Hnatiuk clinic in support of the Players Cup charity, KidSport.

“There will still be a point in time where I’m going to work on my game and get competitive again. Absolutely.”

Hnatiuk, who recently had a cortisone shot in his right elbow to combat some tendonitis, was ordered by his doctor to drop golf for four to six weeks. That followed a long hiatus last winter, nearly six months, when he didn’t touch his clubs because he took up full-time employment as a middle-school phys-ed teacher near his Florida home.

He’s also still teaching golf.

“I won’t be at Q-school this year, I can tell you that much, because I haven’t been able to practise and work at it,” said Hnatiuk, who played six full-time seasons on the PGA Tour and also has four Nationwide Tour victories to his credit. “You want to play at a certain level. I’m not against playing some mini-tour events to just stay competitive. But it’s tough when it’s not quite there. That’s hard.”

Hnatiuk had accepted a Canadian Tour invite to compete this week before his doctor intervened.

Some more caddies would be good

THE Players Cup is still looking for a few more caddies for this week’s $200,000 Canadian Tour event.

Organizers have suggested candidates be at least 13. Anyone interested should call Ross the caddie-master at 791-8555.

Weathering the weather

THERE’S not much left to do but grin and bear it if depressing weather forecasts are anywhere near accurate for the next three days.

Rain and wind are predicted for today’s pro-ams at the Players Cup. More rain is in the mix for Wednesday with a good chance of showers for the tournament’s opening round on Thursday.

It’s several days away but fairer weather is predicted for the end of the week and the weekend.

“We definitely like the better weather,” said Canadian Tour veteran Mike Grob, a six-time winner. “We wait for the summer and it would be nice if we had summer when it got here. But we don’t have a choice sometimes.”

The elements could be a factor for a second straight week on the tour. Last week in Saskatoon, the players had a weather curveball, including wind, rain and cold, just about every day.

“It sounded like it was very tough last week,” said Grob, who was lucky enough to be playing a Nationwide Tour event in Ontario. “Sometimes the weather skips over us and hopefully this is going to miss us.”

Only the deeply committed mudders can be happy with this week’s short-term forecast.

“I can be a good mudder but I don’t really like the bad weather,” Grob added.

“Wind and rain are fine, but when they’re combined, that’s no fun at all. Hopefully we won’t get to that.”

tim.campbell@freepress.mb.ca