JTOG Day 17: Opening Ceremony of The Spirit International

It was a great honor and fortuitous timing to be able to attend the Opening Ceremony of The Spirit International Amateur Golf Championship at the Woodlands Waterway Marriott Hotel & convention Center on the way to Rio. Imagine the coincidence of starting out from Florida seeking to find the ‘Olympic Spirit of Golf’ with really no agenda, no itinerary other than to head south after playing hickory golf in St. Louis at Glen Echo CC where they last played golf in the Olympics in 1904. Then to find that what I was seeking was right there on my way through Texas heading south to Rio. Perhaps The Spirit is an even better format than the Olympics with amateurs competing in a team and individual event.

Maybe there are no coincidences in life after all. Thank you very much Charlie Epps for the suggestion and Tournament Director Eric Fredricksen for the invitation.

Several other serendipitous connections happened that evening.

CLICK here for a Highlight of the Video Interview with American Captain Paige MacKenzie.

The first was coming earlier in the day and meeting Paige MacKenzie, the American Captain and having the opportunity to interview her. As you can see in the Highlight Video Interview above, having competed in the event and being a big fan of the Olympics, she shared some great insight into what I think will define the modern ‘Olympic Spirit’ of Golf’ to be revealed in Rio.

Her comment about being around all the other great athletes in other sports and interacting with them is quite profound when you think about it. Sure that is why we watch the Olympics, to see all the sports and all of the athletes, some of which we don’t get to see very often like curling. Maybe that is how the non-golfers of the world will be perceiving golf for the first time, “that’s kind of a strange sport where you hit a ball, go find it and hit it again until it is in the hole.”

In reality, Paige’s analysis may be what will distinguish Olympic Golf from golf’s Majors, the Ryder and President Cups and the World Golf Championships—there will be other athletic competitions and athletes in and around the golfing competition. Golf likes to promote golf and is very good at it from a business perspective. But to most people, the Olympics are not a business like golf is, there is as much a sense of giving than taking, a philanthropic dimension to all the activity. Quite curiously, the Greek root to the word philanthropy means the “love of humanity.” Perhaps the Olympics is the opportunity for golf to get outside of itself and take part in philanthropy and what it means to be caring, nourishing, developing and enhancing our fellow humans. That seems to be a bit harsh when you consider golf is the most giving sport, in terms of charity donations, surpassing the $2 billion mark earlier this year. But even for golf, I believe the Spirit of the Olympics is beyond what is felt or demonstrated in the sport today. We will see exactly what that is sometime soon.

Harsh or not, we are trying to define a spirit of a sport here which is admittedly undefinable.

After all it is a competition, how can one compete without having a sense of self first and wanting to win more than anyone else? Athletes are athletes, they compete to win, anyway or however than can. Another star for golf as golfers monitor their own performance with respect to the rules and call penalties on themselves to protect the other golfers who are trying to beat them. Why on earth would an athlete ever do that?

Suffice it to say at this point, as Paige alluded to, there is something to golf being in the Olympics beyond other international golf competitions. There are still another 83 days to go and then a whole year before the first Olympic golf ball is struck in Rio. More on the ‘Olympic Spirit of Golf’ as we venture down to the Olympic Golf Course (OGC) Gil Hanse and Amy Alcott have built in Rio.

Other connections made that evening included meeting and interviewing the founder of The Spirit International Corby Robertson, Jr., meeting collegiate golfers from all over the world, and some of the great volunteers from the host club—Whispering Pines.

But the ultimate synchronism of the ‘Journey to Olympic Golf’ was being randomly seated at a table with a delightful couple, originally from Mexico City, but now living in The Woodlands—Delia and Eugenio Nava. He, a previous professional golfer and she a USGA rules official. One of the most humorous stories told that evening had to do with him competing in an event which she officiated and there being an incident by which she made a ruling that was not in his favor. For the sake of friendship with both Delia and Eugenio, that story will not be retold here.

What turned out to be a cordial dinner and a snapshot picture later turned out to be probably the biggest break of the whole Journey for me. As you will see in the days ahead, Delia and Eugenio connected me with some great people in Mexico City who in turn connected me with other great people in Central America, all the way down to South America—Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras,  Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and Panama. They passed me along one to another, Somehow Torch (my 1992 Infiniti M30) with me along for the ride kept trucking along our merri way heading south!

More on all of that as the days are counted to one hundred and it is August 5th, one year before the Opening Ceremonies of Golf in the Olympics!

With the grandeur of the Procession of Countries, speeches by Tournament Director Eric Fredrickson, Founder Corby Robertson, Jr., four-time participant Kim Williams from South Africa (there are no age or term limits in The Spirit, if you are the ebst, you are invited), and Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial Tournament Chairman Bobby Patton announcing a special exemption into his tournament for the winner of the men’s individual competition, there was no doubt I felt a bit of the ‘Olympic Spirit of Golf’ in that room that night.

There is something magical about this ‘Journey to Olympic Golf.’ People are excited about golf being back in the Olympics, literally for the first time in several generations. For whatever reason, the journey I was on, literally and figuratively, resonated with them and they all wanted to help me along on the way to Rio and see me succeed. For that I will be eternally grateful as without their help I may not have made it safely and be here today writing about the experience of these 100 days.

The Opening Ceremony of The Spirit International was definitely a celebration for me as well as for the forty women and forty men from twenty countries that would practice and compete over the next week at Whispering Pines. Sadly I was not able to stay and witness the golfing competition. Most of the odyssey was ahead of me as the first 17 days on the road in America had not netted me one mile south to Rio. Houston and Jacksonville being nearly the same latitude.

The adventure was about to begin for sure!

CLICK here for Video Interview with Spirit Founder Corby Robertson, Jr.

CLICK here for full Video interview with American Captain Paige MacKenzie.

CLICK here for Video Interviews with Volunteers and Whispering Pines Members.

CLICK here for Video Interview with Erik Fredricksen, The Spirit Tournament Director.

There are some more stories in the pictures below this request to make a donation to The First Tee…

I am looking for 100 new friends in the next 100 days to make a $100 donation (or any amount that you are able to make) to The First Tee. Each day I will be reliving the original “Journey to Olympic Golf” and hope to find a new friend in golf. Is that you? Please join me in giving back to the game we all love.

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Please select ‘Andy Reistetter’s Journey to Olympic Golf’ on the drop-down menu for the question ‘What inspired you to make a gift today? This is for tracking purposes only, Andy does not receive any part of your donation or anything financially from The First Tee organization.

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