Amateurs vs. the Best Senior Pros in the World....

[Obee]

Great showing by my good friend and many-time partner, Robert Funk, at the US Senior Open.

 

Just goes to show ya.... On any given day, a really solid tournament-tested amateur can golf his ball as well as the very best players in the world. He's not leading, but he's going to finish ahead of some really fantastic long-time professional golfers today. Hope he backs it up with a solid round tomorrow. His stated goal to me when he left: "Shooting for low Amateur...."

 

Best of luck, Robert!

 

http://www.usga.org/...en/scoring.html

[Obee]

Great showing by my good friend and many-time partner, Robert Funk, at the US Senior Open.

 

Just goes to show ya.... On any given day, a really solid tournament-tested amateur can golf his ball as well as the very best players in the world. He's not leading, but he's going to finish ahead of some really fantastic long-time professional golfers today. Hope he backs it up with a solid round tomorrow. His stated goal to me when he left: "Shooting for low Amateur...."

 

Best of luck, Robert!

 

http://www.usga.org/...en/scoring.html

 

Made the cut!!!

 

 

[Obee]

I guess I will be the only one to comment on my thread! LOL

 

So this is a true lifetime amateur. Was never a professional at any point in his life. Took up golf late. I believe he was in his mid to late 20s.

 

Robert is a member of my club. Played with him hundreds of times. He's had quite a bit of success as an amateur. He won the SCGA Mid-Am twice, The Crane Cup in Florida, and the Trans-Miss Amateur. He also has several team wins over the years.

 

He is a general contractor and works quite a bit, so you can imagine, in order to keep his game at this level, he also plays plenty of golf.

 

Just wanted to note that this is not one of those "professional amateurs" where all he ever does is play golf.

 

I get to see Robert play all the time. I also get to see him play all the time with Tom Pernice, who, over the last ten years, has been one of the very best 45-55 year old golfers in the world.

 

Robert hits the ball long for a 51-year-old golfer. Very long. If you look at the driving stats, I think he is 30th for the two rounds in the open so far. It would not surprise me, though, if he hit hybrid on one of the measured holes a couple times.he is very long, so that is a definite strength. Another strength is putting and I'll say this: given a full year on tour, he would easily be in the top 20% of all putters on the champions tour. He Is that good.

 

Where he struggles? Consistency. The very best players in the world shoot in a very tight range the overwhelming majority of the time. Robert simply shoots too many rounds of 74 to 77 due to inconsistency with his driver, and his iron play. Sometimes that is due to lack of focus and staying committed to his routine, which the best pros are so very good at never getting away from.

 

Another weakness was his short game for a while. When he was focused and "on" the short game was always pretty good. But there were times when it was a liability. Recently, though, due to and ankle surgery, and the rehab to follow, he spent almost 2 months straight working only on short game when he practiced. Ingrained a few things that have not made his short game a true strength. It's actually been very impressive to watch.

 

The coolest thing about all of this? Since he made the cut and is low amateur, he is automatically exempt to the US Senior Open next year. So cool.

[Ed Settle]

Great story and insight. I will be pulling for him this weekend!

[bladehunter]

Op I enjoy your posts more so than most on here. Great news to hear. And great confirmation on a subject that I already knew to be true. There are a lot of very good Ams out there. I play with and against them myself regularly and hope to be one some day !

[Pure745]

So cool! Love that he got to play with Langer and Vijay and really held his own out there. I was playing with Capel last week and was asking him about his experience at Scioto, it's easy to forget this is a PGA event :)

[rangersgoalie]

Played with Robert at first stage of Champions Q a School a few years ago.

He's a heck of a player, made it to finals I believe.

He was also a good guy to play with. Was happy to see him do well in the Senior Open!!

[RBImGuy]

Did well, better next year

[PowderedToastMan]

I have to say, as amazing of a feat this is, and how cool of a story, all I could think was "this must be why my general contractor takes so freaking long to complete a job, he's playing golf 5 1/2 hours a day!

[dan360]

There are so many amateur athletes, in so many sports, who are *this* close. *this*. *close*.

 

Sometimes it just takes luck. Or a benefactor.

 

Hell an auto mechanic pulling his 11 year old car on an open trailer waxed the World of Outlaws sprint cars here locally three years in a row.

 

A big name slammed a $200,000 contract on the table and said " drive for me on the national tour."

 

He said "I can't."

 

He's a single dad to a special needs little boy.

 

 

This. Close.

[SurfDuffer]

A member of our association went 74-69 in the first two rounds. He won the US Senior Am in 2015. He missed the cut at +3. Looking at the leaderboard he bested a lot of big pro names.

[Hawkeye77]

I guess I will be the only one to comment on my thread! LOL

 

So this is a true lifetime amateur. Was never a professional at any point in his life. Took up golf late. I believe he was in his mid to late 20s.

 

Robert is a member of my club. Played with him hundreds of times. He's had quite a bit of success as an amateur. He won the SCGA Mid-Am twice, The Crane Cup in Florida, and the Trans-Miss Amateur. He also has several team wins over the years.

 

He is a general contractor and works quite a bit, so you can imagine, in order to keep his game at this level, he also plays plenty of golf.

 

Just wanted to note that this is not one of those "professional amateurs" where all he ever does is play golf.

 

I get to see Robert play all the time. I also get to see him play all the time with Tom Pernice, who, over the last ten years, has been one of the very best 45-55 year old golfers in the world.

 

Robert hits the ball long for a 51-year-old golfer. Very long. If you look at the driving stats, I think he is 30th for the two rounds in the open so far. It would not surprise me, though, if he hit hybrid on one of the measured holes a couple times.he is very long, so that is a definite strength. Another strength is putting and I'll say this: given a full year on tour, he would easily be in the top 20% of all putters on the champions tour. He Is that good.

 

Where he struggles? Consistency. The very best players in the world shoot in a very tight range the overwhelming majority of the time. Robert simply shoots too many rounds of 74 to 77 due to inconsistency with his driver, and his iron play. Sometimes that is due to lack of focus and staying committed to his routine, which the best pros are so very good at never getting away from.

 

Another weakness was his short game for a while. When he was focused and "on" the short game was always pretty good. But there were times when it was a liability. Recently, though, due to and ankle surgery, and the rehab to follow, he spent almost 2 months straight working only on short game when he practiced. Ingrained a few things that have not made his short game a true strength. It's actually been very impressive to watch.

 

The coolest thing about all of this? Since he made the cut and is low amateur, he is automatically exempt to the US Senior Open next year. So cool.

 

LOL, company over the 4th and missed this one.

 

Great story! Love the comeback aspect as well.

[dan360]

It's cool that he gets to play again next year without having to grind for a spot.

 

Best of luck!!!

[Scooterboy59]

Thanks for the Info on your friend.

[Golfjack]

That's awesome stuff. Playing with and holding up his end with the big boys!

[Slackattack]

I think it's so impressive when a guy who is making a living at something else goes and competes with the best players in the world. It's always been my dream to get my handicap down to scratch so I could enter US Open qualifying. No delusions of actually making it through, but I would love to go out there and be competitive in the locals. I've been down to low single digits before, but I don't play near enough (driving range once a week, play once a month) and I'm in the 6-8 range now.

 

Obee....when you mention that Robert plays a lot of golf....what does that mean? Just curious to see how much serious competitive ams actually play (i.e., in terms of how many holes of golf, how many golf balls on the range, etc.).

[Obee]

I think it's so impressive when a guy who is making a living at something else goes and competes with the best players in the world. It's always been my dream to get my handicap down to scratch so I could enter US Open qualifying. No delusions of actually making it through, but I would love to go out there and be competitive in the locals. I've been down to low single digits before, but I don't play near enough (driving range once a week, play once a month) and I'm in the 6-8 range now.

 

Obee....when you mention that Robert plays a lot of golf....what does that mean? Just curious to see how much serious competitive ams actually play (i.e., in terms of how many holes of golf, how many golf balls on the range, etc.).

 

Most of the guys I know who are really solid, consistent plusses figure out a way to get in 100 to 200 rounds a year, some way, some how.