By ROBERT LINNEHAN
One more qualifying tournament and a 24-year-old golfer who honed his game in Haddonfield could be playing on one of the biggest stages in all of professional golf.
Chris Gold, a Haddonfield Memorial High School graduate, took a huge step towards reaching his dream of playing on the PGA Tour earlier this week when he won a U.S. Open local qualifier at Hidden Creek Golf Course in Egg Harbor Township. Gold shot a 70, two-under par over the 7,015-yard course, good for first place in the tournament.
The next step? Playing in a sectional tournament on June 6 at Woodmont Country Club in Maryland. A top-10 finish will book his trip to the 2011 U.S. Open, which is held just a week late on June 13 at Congressional Country Club in Bethesda, Md.
“The main goal for me has always been to play on the Nationwide and PGA tour,” Gold said.
The University of Maryland graduate sharpened his game a few days before the local qualifier at Little Mill Country Club. Before a tournament, Gold said he likes to look back at the statistics of his last few events and see what he needs to work on to improve his game.
Leading into the sectional tournament, Gold said his iron play will need some fine tuning if he hopes to land one of the top-six spots and an invitation to the U.S. Open.
“I definitely need to improve my iron play. The long irons were playing really well and my short game is up to par, but I need to work on my mid irons. I was missing a lot of greens,” he said. “I’ve been working really hard on my driver and just getting the ball in play lately as well.”
Besides the prestige of playing in one of the most well-known golf tournaments in the world, Gold said it would help to get some national television exposure. Currently TaylorMade and Adidas are sponsoring Gold, sending him clubs and equipment, but the young golfer said the major sponsors don’t pay money unless a golfer is seen on television.
Until the sectional, Gold said he would continue to participate in tournaments in the Peach State Tour down in Georgia. Gold is a permanent resident of Reunion Resort in Orlando, Fla. He commutes to Georgia for events on the Peach State Tour.
Gold also said he would continue to participate in the PGA Tour’s “Q-School,” a series of annual qualifying tournaments for aspiring professional golfers. There are four-stages of the qualifying school, Gold said, and he was in the third stage last year.
“I don’t know how great of an analogy this is, but it’s like the Phillies farm team, I could have gotten called up last year,” he said with a chuckle.
But until then he’ll sharpen his game in the state and down in Florida, waiting for the day in June when an U.S. Open official will announce his name at the first tee of one of golf’s grand stages.
