Living 18 holes at a time

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/08/2010 (5894 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In an entire lifetime, some never discover the passion of golf.

Others come close, but can’t sustain it. Still others encounter it but unable to perfect a game that can’t be perfected, it overwhelms and repels them.

 

And then there is Andy Jacobsen, 49, who has been at this quest barely a year.

"My goal is hopefully within the next year or year and a half to try to get down to a four or five handicap," said Jacobsen, a 16-handicapper clear about his passion to improve. "I’m going to practise all winter.

"Next year, Golf Manitoba, they’re going to know who Andy is, because I’m coming."

Such is the clarity provided by Jacobsen’s terminal lung cancer.

He was a once-a-year-if-he-was-lucky golfer until his diagnosis three years ago.

"They said I had about a year," Jacobsen said in a recent conversation. "I’m still here. I’m enjoying my life. I wish I felt as good as I looked sometimes. It’s hard sometimes. You have to be on a lot of medications. But I have a good support system at home and with my family."

In his determination to exact the maximum joy from each day, Jacobsen liked the sound of a suggestion made to him by longtime friend Bobby Knox, a member of Transcona Golf Club.

"After I got sick and couldn’t work anymore, he asked me to come play with the group (at Transcona)," Jacobsen said. "Then he suggested I join. They’re the ones that got me into it."

He played a fair bit in 2009, but too late in the season to bother with a membership.

In 2010, however, Jacobsen said he spends 10 to 12 hours a day at the club, so nobody will be surprised to hear he has played more than 180 games of golf this year.

"I just love being here," he said. "Every morning, getting up, this is what I look forward to, going out to play. Like how quick can I get to the golf course?"

The passion of his new sweet spot led Jacobsen to wonder why he shouldn’t take a crack at a tournament. A real tournament.

So he entered the Manitoba Mid-Amateur Championship, which took place two weeks ago at difficult Granite Hills Golf Club.

"When I found out what I had gotten myself into, that I’d entered that Mid-Amateur, people said to me that it was a gutsy manoeuvre for a guy like me," Jacobsen smiled. "At that time, I was a 21 handicap, so I figured I’d better start working to get it down.

"So I played 36 holes a day for about two months. Nobody really expected me to do anything when I was out there. People were saying I wouldn’t break 100 one day."

"People" — some of whom were rumoured to have bet the course would inflict a daily triple-digit beating — underestimated Jacobsen’s new-found sympatico with the game.

He shot 99-88-98-87. His final nine holes were his best, a 42, and he finished 45th in a field of 58.

Before his first-day tee time, worried he was in over his head, Jacobsen was a shaking, nervous mess near the first tee.

Eventual champion Garth Collings spotted him, walked up to him and said hello.

"He said to me, ‘It’s just another game, kid. Just go out there and enjoy yourself and keep your ball in play,’" Jacobsen said.

Collings’ greetings continued each day, along with a score check.

"Fourth day, he sinks the last putt and he’s won," Jacobsen said. "Then he comes right through the crowd and says, ‘How’d you shoot, kid?’ He grabbed my hand, shook it, gave me a big hug and damn near squeezed the life out of me."

Collings said he learned some of Jacobsen’s story from mutual friends at the tournament.

"The whole thing puts a lump in my throat," Collings said. The feeling, it seems, is mutual.

"He didn’t know me from anything," Jacobsen said. "What an unbelievable gentleman.

"And Pat Beaudoin (Transcona’s assistant pro), Dave McMillan (the club’s head pro), they were texting me and supporting me every day.

"Pat and Mike (Berney, Manitoba’s new senior champ and his roommate during the Granite Hills tournament), I’ve leaned on those guys a lot this year.

"And the people at the club, most of them have said something encouraging to me. So classy. It makes you feel so good inside.

"What a sport."

Jacobsen said he’s energized by his mid-amateur experience, though "It took a lot out of me because it was so mentally draining. Now I understand what golfers go through," he said.

"Of all the sports I’ve ever played, this is the one that’s given me the fondest memory I’ll ever have. This is a summer I’ll never forget.

"It brings a tear to my eye."

As for the fear of his future, Jacobsen seems resolved.

"I’ve more or less said I’m going to live every day the best that I can," he said. "When they said there was nothing they could really do — because I went see a surgeon about lung transplants and chemo and all that — well, I watched my mom go through it. She died of leukemia. When she got towards the end, she had more bad days than quality days. I don’t want that. With chemo and everything else, if you’re going to have five bad days just to get two good days, it’s not worth it to me.

"So when it happens it happens. My doctor has kept me going. I have a nurse that visits the house on Wednesdays. I have a great doctor, a great support system.

"What I really want to do is play in some more tournaments, God willing my health holds out a bit longer. There’s something in me, I have that drive. I want to play, I want to get better."

Fear of how a golf shot may end up or how a round may turn out — the game’s greatest mental obstacles — those reveal Jacobsen has a true passion.

"How do you know when you’re out of your league?" he said. "Put a foot forward and try. One good game and you get a little confidence, and a new goal. That’s how it starts.

"People were saying I was going to play (the mid-amateur) at one of the hardest courses in Manitoba. When somebody says I can’t do something — wrong. I will not bow. I’m stubborn.

"Same as when they told me, ‘You’ve got a year.’ I just won’t lay down. I have other goals. I want to win. I’m going to win. I’m not done yet."

tim.campbell@freepress.mb.ca