The battle was intense, but Lydia Ko dropped some key putts as Danielle Kang could only watch.
BOCA RATON, FL. – The first full-field event of the Ladies PGA tour’s 2022 season was just a two-player duel between two of the circuit’s most popular stars. One of them not only came away with a vicrtory but also gave herself a big boost for her Hall of Fame aspirations.
Lydia Ko, a 24-year old New Zealander who was an instant sensation when she came on the tour at age 16, took her 17th career LPGA title by holding off 29-year old American Danielle Kang. The good friends were in the spotlight throughout in the $2 million Gainbridge Championship at Boca Rio.
Ko took the first-round lead with a 63 and Kang rallied into a tie for the top spot after 36 holes. They played together in the final two rounds, and Ko regained her two-stroke advantage with a solid even par round in cold windy weather on Saturday.
Kang, the runner-up to Nelly Korda in last year’s Gainbridge event, got back into a tie when Ko got off to a slow start on Sunday. They took turns taking sole possession of the top spot until Ko claimed it for good with birdies at Nos. 15 and 16, and she protected it with stellar bunker shots to save pars on the final two holes.
“The putt on 15 was really the momentum shifter,’’ said Ko. “I kept reading it further and further right, and it turned out the perfect read.’’ Kang had the same problem with the read from seven feet and agreed. But she missed hers.
The winner of last week’s season-opening Tournament of Champions at Lake Nona, in the Orlando area where Ko now resides, Kang missed a 15-foot birdie putt on the final green to end her hopes of sending the seesaw competition to a playoff. Ko finished at 14-under-par 274 for the regulation 72 holes, one swing better than Kang.
In addition to claiming the $300,000 winner’s check Ko boosted her chances of making it into the LPGA Hall of Fame. Selection is determined on a performance-based point total. She has 21 points and needs 27.
“Sometimes I try to be too much of a perfectionist,’’ she said. “The Hall of Fame would be huge, but I just try to play my best golf.’’
She became the youngest-ever player-of-the-year in professional golf history — male or female — to be named rookie-of-the-year when she started her LPGA career. Ko won two major championships among her victories early in her career and medals in two Olympics after that, but wins have been hard to come by – until Sunday. It was the first of her LPGA victories claimed in the month of Januaryafter failing to win on the LPGA tour in 2021.
Ko is taking this week’s final of three straights stop of the LPGA’s Florida swing off. This week’s event is the Drive On Championship in Ft. Myers.
Lydia Ko had her driver working, and she wound up with the Gainsbridge trophy.
Rory Spears and I were Outstanding Achievers in the ING Podcast Category in 2022.
The Chicago area was well represented at the International Network of Golf’s Media Awards announcement, made at the 69th PGA Merchandise Show at the Orange County Convention Center in Orlando, FL.
Dave Lockhart’s Golf 360 was named the top television show and Steve Kashul’s Golf Scene was named the best in the Internet video category.
Rory Spears and I were multiple winners of Outstanding Achievers awards, given to those finishing in the second through fourth positions in each category. Two of Rory’s three such awards came for his broadcast efforts (on Golfers on Golf radio and the Ziehm & Spears Podcast Series). This marked the first year that I won something in a broadcast category.
In addition to my part in the podcast series I received one in competition writing for a piece on the Ryder Cup in the Daily Herald. This marked the sixth straight year that I won at least one Media Award (there was no competition in 2021).
The run started in 2016 and I had multiple awards in four of the six years. In 2022 I earned my first Award in the podcast category. Four of my Awards came in competition, including my lone win in 2018. I have won twice in Travel and Opinion/Editorial and once each in Equipment/Apparel and Business.
Zero Friction president John Iacono introduced a three-in-one golf bag at the PGA Merchandise Show.
ORLANDO, FL. – The biggest show in golf wrapped up on Friday at the Orange County Convention Center, and the 69th PGA Merchandise Show was a bit different than the previous 68 stagings. The pandemic forced cancelation of the show in 2021 and the two-year hiatus took its toll
Normally the show has about 1,000 brands showing their products for three days at the OCCC. This year there were only about 600. The event’s Demo Day — an outdoor attraction at Orange County National the day before the OCCC opens its doors — had only a sparse crowd this time, in part because of cold, rainy weather.
While most all of the major equipment manufacturers were absent, the show was by no means a downer. Zero Friction, the Oak Brook Terrace-based company that was a big hit at the show two years ago, didn’t miss a beat with the big companies gone.
“I was extremely disappointed to not see the large brands, the ones who consider themselves to be the leaders of the industry, to take this opportunity to back out,’’ said John Iacono, the Zero Friction president. “I don’t think you’re a leader of much of anything if you’re not on the front lines. Here it’s the rest of the industry – the small brands like ours. Everybody had difficulties keeping their businesses going during the pandemic. The bigger brands, who profited heavily in this industry, didn’t take time to have a smaller presence here, and I feel that’s sad. It’s a sore eye for the golf industry when the leaders aren’t leading at all.’’
How the show, which has been closed to the public but still drew 40,000 industry members annually, will change in 2023 remains to be seen but Iacono is optimistic about his own company’s growth.
Zero Friction started as a manufacturer of wooden tees in 2006 and expanded to other golf products in 2012. Both its line of tees and gloves were recipients of Industry Honors by the International Network of Golf at the 2020 show, and since then the company opened sales offices in Charlotte, N.C.; Kansas City and London added its own distribution center in Melrose Park.
With many of its products produced overseas, a quality control director based in Indonesia was added to the staff. The gloves are now sold in 26 countries, and Iacono believes that the newest model of tees will be a big hit. This model has a divot repair tool built in.
“A tee product that can be used to repair a green that can be put in every player’s hand – that’s a must have,’’ said Iacono.
The company’s newest product, the Wheel Pro golf bag, was one of the biggest hits of this year’s show. It’s a three-in-one bag. It starts as a push bag. If you want to walk and carry, you pop the wheels off. If you want to ride you stick it in your cart. That’s one versatile golf bag, and it carries a retail price of $349.
In May Iacono plans to introduce a completely recycled golf ball called the Eagle Z. The covers of old golf balls will be scraped off, recycled and put on the cores of the old balls. Ball prices figure to be soaring because of problems obtaining surlyn, a key ingredient.
“The pandemic gave us an opportunity to structure differently for long-term growth,’’ said Iacono. “We’ll grow as long as we produce interesting new products that show technological advancement and are priced fairly.’’
Last week’s cold weather hampered Nelly Korda (right) in the LPGA’s Tournament of Champions but warmer temperatures are expected this week at Boca Rio.
BOCA RATON, FL. — The first full field event of the LPGA’s 2022 season tees off on Thursday at Boca Rio Golf Club. It’ll have 120 players, but not Annika Sorenstam.
Sorenstam, who won 72 tournaments on the LPGA tour before taking 13 years off from golf competition, is still tinkering with a comeback but her next tournament won’t be for a while. She was a big reason why the LPGA’s season-opening Tournament of Champions was a big hit.
Despite cold, sometimes rainy, weather the gallery turned out in bigger than usual numbers to see Sorenstam compete at Lake Nona, her home course. She did well, but is taking a break now.
“I won’t play next week. It’s the PGA (Merchandise) Show (in Orlando), and we have a fun week coming up,’’ she said. “We have a busy week with meetings with sponsors.’’
“Next week’’ is also the Gainbridge Championship. Sorenstam will leave that one up to Danielle Kang, who took a three-shot victory in the LPGA portion of the Tournament of Champions on Sunday, and her main rivals of the previous four days – Mexico’s Gaby Lopez, Canadian Brooke Henderson and the Korda sisters – Nelly and Jessica.
Nelly is the defending champion in the Gainbridge, having won last year when the event was played at Lake Nona. Kang won the T of C, finishing at 16-under-par for 72 holes and earned $225,000.
“I shot 4-under on a cold day and 3-under (in the third round) – probably the best I’ve ever played in the cold,’’ she said. Last year Kang lost the Tournament of Champions title to Korda’s sister Jessica in a playoff at Tranquilo, another course in the Orlando area.
Kang, a 29-year old Californian, won for the sixth time on the LPGA tour but her biggest win was her first. She won the 2017 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, one of the circuit’s majors, at Olympia Fields.
Sorenstam has a couple tournaments coming up, one in February and a senior event in March. She lost a playoff to former major league pitcher Derek Lowe in the celebrity division of the T of C. Lowe got the win by making a 25-foot birdie putt on the first hole of sudden death but Sorenstam took the whole four-day test in stride.
“I’m not sure what I expected, but I’m super pleased with the great pairings I had all week,’’ said Sorenstam. “If this tournament was played at any other course I probably wouldn’t be playing, but this is why I came here in the first place. The support is fantastic, I love this golf course and I’m a proud member for sure.’’
Sweden’s Madelene Sagstrom won the Gainbridge title when the event was played at Boca Rio in 2020, and she’ll also be in the field this week. She finished 17th in the Tournament of Champions.
Nelly Korda led the T of C after 54 holes but shot 75 on Sunday to finish in a tie for fourth.
“I was freezing,’’ she said. “I always get colder than it actually is. That’s why I always stay away from tournaments that are always in the cold.’’
Korda lives in Bradenton, FL., and it’s rarely as cold in the Sunshine State as it was last week. Lexi Thompson, who is from Delray Beach, FL., will make her season debut at Boca Rio. She didn’t qualify for the T of C field. Australian Karrie Webb is also in the field. A former major champion, she will return to the LPGA circuit for the first time in two years. The Gainbridge field includes 16 of the top 25 in the world rankings.
The sponsor exemptions are also interesting. Taylor Collins, a teaching professional at nearby Coral Ridge Country Club in Ft. Lauderdale, was the first woman to win the South Florida PGA Section title in 42 years and Nishtha Madan, a promising player from India, will be making her LPGA debut. She will compete on the Symetra Tour in 2022.
LAKE NONA, FL. – Annika Sorenstam didn’t win on Sunday but – as the only woman in a 50-player group of celebrities that included famous sport stars like Roger Clemens, Greg Maddux, Brian Urlacher, Jeremy Roenick, John Smoltz, Sterling Sharp and Tom Glavin, the 51-year old golf legend did just fine. No doubt she was the star of the show at the first event of the LPGA season
She beat all of those big names in her group at the LPGA Tournament of Champions, but lost the celebrity title to Derek Lowe – a major-league pitcher for 17 seasons. He earned $100,000 by winning their one-hole playoff after Sorenstam forced extra holes with a clutch par on the last hole of regulation play.
“To play against Annika Sorenstam, how many people can say that – and in a playoff and prevail?’’ said Lowe. “She’s a special person. She means a lot to Lake Nona (the host club) and to all of golf.’’
Sorenstam, who won 17 tournaments on the LPGA tour before taking 13 years off from golf competition, is still tinkering with a comeback.
“I won’t play next week. It’s the PGA (Merchandise) Show (in Orlando), and we have a fun week coming up,’’ she said. “We have a busy week with meetings with sponsors.’’
“Next week’’ is also the LPGA’s first full-field event of 2022 – the Gainbridge Championship in Boca Raton, FL. She’ll leave that one up to Danielle Kang, who took a three-shot victory in the LPGA portion of the Tournament of Champions on Sunday, and her rivals of the previous four days – Mexico’s Gaby Lopez, Canadian Brooke Henderson and the Korda sisters – Nelly and Jessica.
Kang shot a 68 Sunday on the same 6,617-yard layout that the men played on. She finished at 16-under-par for 72 holes and earned $225,000.
“I shot 4-under on a cold day and 3-under yesterday – probably the best I’ve ever played in the cold,’’ she said. Last year Kang lost the Tournament of Champions title to Korda’s sister Jessica in a playoff at Tranquilo, another course in the Orlando area.
Kang, a 29-year old Californian, won for the sixth time on the LPGA tour but her biggest win was her first. She won the 2017 KPMG Women’s PGA Championship, one of the circuit’s majors, at Olympia Fields.
As good as Kang was, the star of the show was Sorenstam, who was paired with the top LPGA players throughout the four rounds. The women’s competition was at stroke play, the celebs played in Modified Stableford point system.
“I’m not sure what I expected, but I’m super pleased with the great pairings I had all week,’’ said Sorenstam. “If this tournament was played at any other course I probably wouldn’t be playing, but this is why I came here in the first place. The support is fantastic, I love this golf course and I’m a proud member for sure.’’
Annika Sorenstam, with husband Mike McGee on the bag, is showing — at age 51 — that she can play with the LPGA’s best players in the circuit’s Tournament of Champions.
LAKE NONA, FL. – The Ladies PGA Tour, like the PGA Tour and PGA Tour Champions, opens each season with a Tournament of Champions. The women do it a little differently, though. They hold a celebrity event in conjunction with theirs, and Saturday’s third round had an even more unusual twist.
Paired in the final group was the legendary Annika Sorenstam, winner of 72 LPGA titles, and current world No. 1 Nelly Korda. Both could win titles in today’s final round.
The 22-year old Korda, whose older sister Jessica is the defending champion, owns a one-stroke lead over Danielle Kang and Gaby Lopez among the 29 LPGA members. Sorenstam, who had been out of tournament golf for 13 years until making a mini-comeback last year, has a two-point lead in the celebrity division.
Sorenstam, a member of the Lake Nona club that is hosting the tournament, is 51 and the only woman in a 50-player field of celebrities that include former Chicago sports heroes Jeremy Roenick, Brian Urlacher, Jon Lester and A.J. Pierzynski. Because the LPGA players are competing at stroke play and the celebrities are using a Stableford point system, it’s to difficult to compare their performances.
Last year Sorenstam, on a whim, entered an LPGA tournament and made the cut. Then she was a run-away winner of the U.S. Women’s Senior Open. When she headed the field in the Tournament of Champions, limited to players who have won LPGA titles in the last two years, a comeback story seemed in the offing.
Sorenstam didn’t exactly quell those rumors this week.
“I’m thinking how much golf I’m going to play after this event,’’ she said. “I’m not really sure.’’
She is raising a family now, and that’s just one factor.
“There’s really a fine balance, especially when you play with the best,’’ she said. “You see the level of players you’re playing against and you realize you’re not there anymore. My mindset isn’t the way it used to be.’’
She remains a drawing card, however. In previous years the celebrity competitors drew as much attention as the LPGA competitors in the Tournament of Champions. On Saturday, in chilly weather that included some rain, that wasn’t the case. The LPGA regulars and the celebrities were mixed together and the bigger than usual roving galleries supported all the women, but especially Sorenstam and the Korda sisters.
“(Sorenstam) has so much game. It was cool to see,’’ said Nelly Korda. “She shot 1- or 2-under on the back nine. She’s not hitting it as far off the tee, but her woods and iron game is so good.’’
The 69th PGA Merchandise Show is coming up this week in Orlando, FL., and that’s generally a big week for club professionals nation-wide who use the big event at the Orange County Convention Center to begin preparations for another season.
It won’t be quite the same this year for two of Chicago’s longest-standing club leaders. Both Bob Malpede and Brian Morrison retired once the calendar turned to 2022. Malpede, who will attend the show to renew acquaintances, finished a 16-year run in a dual role – general manager and head golf professional – at White Deer Run, in Vernon Hills.
Morrison, who spent 21 seasons at Olympia Fields and was the storied club’s director of golf, is now living in Florida. The 2003 U.S. Open, 2015 U.S. Amateur and 2020 BMW Championship were all held at Olympia during Morrison’s tenure there. Douglas Farrell has moved up from head professional to become Olympia’s new director of golf.
Malpede isn’t ready to end residence in Illinois, where his golf roots are deep. He got started in the business at Pistakee Bay, in McHenry, when his father owned the club. He formally entered the professional ranks in 1972 at Glen Flora, in Waukegan, and also did time as an assistant pro at Knollwood, in Lake Forest, and Bel-Air and Riviera, in California.
After landing his first head pro job at Columbine, in Colorado, Malpede returned to Illinois where he got the golf operations started at two new clubs. He was the first head pro at both Stonebridge, in Aurora, and Stonewall Orchard, in Grayslake, and remains a managing partner at Stonewall. He’ll remain on staff at White Deer Run as pro emeritus.
Another club has announced a change in head pros. Stonebridge has named Steve Gillie to the job. He had been a teaching pro at Boulder Ridge, in Lake in the Hills.
NEW WGA CHAIRMAN: Joe Desch is the new chairman of the Western Golf Association. The Cincinnati resident succeeds Kevin Buggy, of Park Ridge Country Club, in the leadership role.
Desch, along with four of his brothers, attended college on an WGA Evans’ Scholarships. Desch attended Miami of Ohio after working as a caddie as a youth.
“It’s exciting, and very humbling, being an (Evans Scholars) alumni and having a chance to do this,’’ said Desch, who has lofty goals for the organization that has raised money for college scholarships for caddies since 1930. Over 1,000 students are now attending colleges on Evans Scholarships. He’s been on the WGA board of directors since 2021.
“Now the goal is to have 1,500 Evans Scholars by 2030,’’ said Desch. “We’re moving to a more nationwide organization and trying to be much more than a Midwest scholarship. We also want more diversity – women and kids of color among our caddies as well as at our staff headquarters.’’
HERE AND THERE – Naperville Country Club, celebrating its 100-year anniversary, has broken ground on a $2.7 million clubhouse renovation….Luke Donald, the former Northwestern star and world No. 1, has struggled with back problems in recent years but he made the cut in his first 2022 start at the Sony Open of Hawaii on Sunday. He tied for 27th, his best finish of the PGA Tour’s 2021-22 wrap-around season.….Neither Chicago club manufacturer, Wilson or Tour Edge, will be represented at the PGA Merchandise Show but Zero Friction, of Oakbrook Terrace, will have a prominent role. It has created the official tee and indoor hitting range for the show and will also introduce its new push-cart golf bag and TheraTech golf glove.
Madelene Sagstrom (left) and the Korda sisters — Nelly (left) and Jessica — will be prime time players when the LPGA opens its season with three tournaments in Florida.
Dismiss the fact that the PGA Tour has played tournaments in Hawaii the last two weeks. The 2022 golf season really starts this week. That’s when the golf spotlight shifts to Florida and will stay there for a while.
The PGA Merchandise Show returns after taking a year off because of pandemic concerns and the LPGA – after concluding 2021 with two stops in the Sunshine State – gets back in action with its first three tournaments of the new year in Florida.
The PGA Tour returns to the mainland with the Farmers Insurance Open in California and PGA Tour Champions has its Tournament of Champions in Hawaii, but those events don’t match the glut of activity the women are planning around the Merchandise Show.
First event is this week’s LPGA’s 2022 debut, the Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions. In addition to the new title sponsor the tourney has a new venue, Lake Nona on the outskirts of Orlando. It’ll be a four-day 72-hole battle of players who have won on the circuit in the last two years and there’ll be a celebrity competition mixed in. Play begins on Thursday.
As soon as the last putt drops at Lake Nona on Sunday the scene shifts to nearby Orange County National for a scaled down version of the Demo Day that traditionally preceded the big show at the Orange County Convention Center. Most the major club manufacturers won’t be at the show this time, but there’ll be an array of golf-related companies on hand. It won’t be quite the traditional New Year’s celebration when golf diehards gather, but it’ll be as close to a return to normalcy as we can get for now.
It won’t be easy for the LPGA’s tournament offerings to match last year’s, either.
The 2021 season started with Jessica Korda winning the Tournament of Champions and her sister Nelly winning the first regular season event, the Gainbridge Championship then played at Lake Nona. That was only the second time sisters won back-to-back events on the LPGA Tour, the first being in 2000 when Lake Nona member Annika Sorenstam and her sister Charlotta pulled off the feat.
This year’s T of C has a new site and a $1.5 million purse for the 72-hole no-cut tournament. The field includes six of the top 10 in the women’s world rankings and also features Japan’s Nasa Hataoka, who calls Lake Nona “my member course’’ because she practices there throughout the season; and Michelle Wie West.
This year the Gainbridge moves back to Boca Rio, in Boca Raton, with Nelly going in as the defending champion in a 120-player field with $2 million in prize money on the line from Jan. 27-30. She’s coming off a spectacular year and the Gainbridge win started it all. It came in late February of 2021 and was her fourth professional win but the first with her parents, both Florida residents, on hand.
Nelly went on to win four more titles in 2021 including the Olympic gold medal en route to claiming the No. 1 world ranking. Her sister will be the defending champion at the Tournament of Champions.
Though Nelly is the defender at Boca Rio, Sweden’s Madelene Sagstrom feels like one, too. She won the 2020 Gainbridge tournament there. It was her first win as a pro.
“I’m biased about this place,’’ said Sagstrom, who now lives in Orlando and will also be in the field at Lake Nona. “On Friday (of her win in 2020) I shot 62 – my lowest round by three shots.’’
Adding to that, she did it with the father of her boyfriend working as an emergency caddie when her usual bag-toter couldn’t get to the tournament on time. Her game slipped a bit after the tour shut down play a month later.
“Before the pandemic I was on a role, but then we were out for five months and I lost my rhythm for a while,’’ she said, “but I did finish second in a major (T2 at British Open) and got it back.’’
The Gainbridge field also includes Delray Beach resident Lexi Thompson, who will be making her 2022 debut. She didn’t qualify for the Tournament of Champions. The field also includes Brooke Henderson, the popular Canadian player; New Zealand’s Lydia Ko and Korea’s Inbee Park, who is coming off a lengthy layoff from competition.
After that the LPGA concludes its run of Florida tourney to start the season at the Feb. 3-5 Drive On Championship at the Crown Colony course Ft. Myers.
If you’re a golfer you’ve got to envy Tom Coyne. Lots of author types – me included to some extent – have been more than willing to write about their golf travels in some form or another. Coyne has done it much better than most. He’s a globe-trotting golfer with lots of stories to tell.
Coyne wrote two books based on his visits to hundreds of courses overseas. There were called “A Course Called Ireland’’ and “A Course Called Scotland.’’ An Philadelphia-based writer, I found it odd that he attacked courses overseas before exploring the great American golf scene closer to home, but he made up for that with his just-released “A Course Called America’’ (Avid Reader Press).
This is the most readable in-depth book on golf travel that I’ve ever encountered. Coyne’s passion for golf is obvious, and he’s gone the extra mile – or many miles – to do the job right.
His plan was to play courses in all 50 states, and he did that over a series of trips that took him to 295 courses. He played 5,182 holes over 301 rounds and covered (mostly walking) 1,748,777 yards. In every stop he provides historical tidbits while mixing in his own encounters with a wide range of people along the way. It’s by no means limited to an analysis of the courses he visited. That approach has been tried by many golf fanatics before him and doesn’t make for very interesting reading.
Coyne tells his stories in 383 pages and then wraps it up by listing all the courses he played and naming his top 10 in several categories. Naturally I want to take issue with him on some of that, though I’ve played only 19 of the 80 he cited for special mention. Coyne’s a better golfer than I ever was, but resort golf is my thing, too, so I’m happy to note that I played seven of his top 10 in that category. His favorite resort destination was Gamble Sands, in Washington. I’ll have to find a way to get to that one.
We did agree on Nos. 2-4 – Oregon’s Bandon Dunes and Bandon Trails and Wisconsin’s Mammoth Dunes. We also both liked Florida’s Streamsong Red, Michigan’s Black course on The Loop layout and Arcadia Bluffs and Mississippi’s Old Waverly.
We’re both fans of short courses, and he had a surprise third pick in that category – Evanston’s Canal Shores. We shared enthusiasm for The Cradle, in North Carolina; Palm Beach Par Three, in Florida; and Top of the Rock, in Missouri.
As far as Best Golf States are concerned, we have big differences. Coyne doesn’t include Florida or Illinois in his top 10. New York is Coyne’s No. 1 – really??? – and Minnesota is No. 10 – he’s got to be kidding!
Anyway, a fun read that is full of interesting background information. It’ll challenge the knowledge of even the most avid golf historians.
With golf carts dominating street parking lots The Villages is clearly a hotbed for the sport and an ideal place to introduce an innovative new method designed to make players better.
THE VILLAGES, Florida – Golf is huge in The Villages, a fast-growing vibrant over-55 adult community in Central Florida. That’s obvious. Golf carts are everywhere, and not just at the courses.
Golf carts of all sizes and colors fill the area’s parking lots as well as those at the 12 championship and 40 executive courses and the three golf academies. Not all the golf carts are driven by golfers, either, but they are entrenched in The Villages’ lifestyle.
This year, though, the most significant offering for golfers might not involve the courses or the golf carts. The Aviv Golf Performance Program was introduced four months ago, and it involves much more than hitting quality golf shots. It’s for people who are very serious about their long-range health as well as their golf improvement.
The program’s time requirements are demanding, and its $56,500 price for a 12-week program includes a personalized medical team and sophisticated equipment but doesn’t include lodging or meals. You need to be on site because the program is built around Aviv’s proprietary hyperbaric oxygen therapy protocol, and its treatments run two hours a day, five days a week. More than anything the therapy treatments set the Aviv program apart from other golf performance offerings, but there’s more to it than that.
Aviv Clinics also include a personal protocol of neuro-cognitive therapy, physiological training and nutritional coaching in addition to golf coaching. As far as the U.S. goes, the Aviv program is offered only in The Villages. The program, based off 12 years of research done by Dr. Shai Efrati in Israel, was taken to Dubai just after its arrival in Florida. That’s where golf specific instruction was incorporated.
Here’s one of the dives, where the hyperbaric oxygen therapy treatments are administered.
More facilities are scheduled to be added in 2023, but the golf component at those has not been determined.
“Our target population is healthy individuals in the 40-45 range who started seeing a slip in their golf games,’’ said Aaron Tribby, Aviv’s head of physical performance in Florida. “But we see a lot of other clients who have other problems. The youngest we’ve had here is 20, the oldest 95.’’
Victims of strokes and brain injuries have benefitted from the hyperbaric oxygen therapy treatments, and they’re also designed to reverse biological aging. Dave Globig, the chief executive officer of the Aviv Clinics in The Villages, and physician Mohammed Elamir both thought the program sounded too good to be true when they were invited to see it in operation in Israel but they became believers.
“At first I was very skeptical,’’ said Globig, who had worked in the health care industry for 25 years. “But I was intrigued. Our program is still very cutting edge, and taking it is almost a full-time job. Most of our clients are battling the aging process. They’re afraid of dementia, of losing their physical capacity. That’s why they come to us. For aging people, what’s their No. 1 sport? Golf.’’
Elamir, the son of a neurologist, was a general practitioner looking for new opportunities. He found the Aviv program a help in his father’s recovery from a small stroke and now oversees the oxygen therapy aspect.
Aviv’s logo — and a depiction of the brain — adorns the welcoming area at the clinic in The Villages.
Smokers are not allowed in that program, and the inclusion of golf was not taken lightly.
Aviv made a major commitment to the sport as sponsor of November’s Aviv Dubai Championships, which concluded the season for what is now called the DP World Tour. (That’s the rebranded name for what had been the European PGA Tour). DP World had been Aviv’s business partner in Dubai and got Aviv its first title sponsorship in golf.
Aviv’s golf program begins with a week of testing that includes blood work, nutrition, a cognitive and genetic evaluation, brain scan and physiology and strength exams. Then the hyperbaric oxygen therapy sessions begin for each client, and they’re supplemented by appointments with 50-60 staffers specializing in other areas of need.
Each client has a personalized treatment program. Golf sessions are included in that, and the golf professionals meet with Aviv staffers on a regular basis to analyze the needs and progress of each client.
With pandemic protocols in place Dr. Mohammed Elamir explains how the Aviv Golf Performance Program works in conjunction with the medical components.
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy, and many of the other treatment programs, are conducted at the Central Florida Aviv clinic – a floor in the Center for Advanced Healthcare, It’s a complex that includes the Brownwood Hotel & Spa, a Wolfgang Puck restaurant and offices for other providers in the healthcare field.
The oxygen therapy is administered in “dives’’ – rooms that have chambers (also called suites) for about 12 clients. In the two-hour sessions the clients receive oxygen for 20 minutes, then are off for five minutes, and that routine is repeated until the two hours are up. Clients wear oxygen masks (not the masks worn by so many to combat Covid in these pandemic times) and they engage in cognitive exercises on a tablet during the process. Elamir says they only experience a popping of the ears for the first 10 minutes. Then he likens the experience to taking a ride in a small airplane.
The reward is stem cell, blood vessel and neurological growth that optimizes brain performance and improves overall health. Aviv’s leadership claims that – in conjunction with the other treatments and coaching – will translate into better golf scores as well as better overall health.
Cognitive benefits are said to be improved hand/eye coordination, increased focus and attention and better mental clarity and patience. Physical benefits are enhanced swing quality, faster recovery after a round and improved strength, mobility and stability.
“One of the biggest challenges we have in health care is that it’s so fragmented,’’ said Globig. “Can you find a similar program (for golf development)? I’m sure you could, but they won’t have the clinical elements involved, and the foundation to go with it.’’
BOCA RATON, FL. – The first full-field event of the Ladies PGA tour’s 2022 season was just a two-player duel between two of the circuit’s most popular stars. One of them not only came away with a vicrtory but also gave herself a big boost for her Hall of Fame aspirations.
