You make your luck

Trevor Immelman, with his moving victory in the US Masters tournament at Augusta, has transformed a good golf career into a great one.

Such is the allure of the Majors, especially the Masters which is the only one of the four played at the same venue each year, that Immelman has instantly gone from being an impressive golfer to being ranked alongside Ernie Els and Retief Goosen, the other “modern” major winners, although still some way behind legends Gary Player and Bobby Locke.

His is a name that I first became aware of some 20 years ago.

I was writing a column for the Financial Mail (which I have recently resumed) and was encouraged to write about holes-in-one – or, in my case, the lack of them! – by a snippet that an 8-year-old had aced one of the short holes at the Somerset West Golf Club.

His name was Trevor Immelman. He would have another soon afterwards, become a scratch handicap player by the time he was 12 and advance through the ranks to be South Africa’s youngest amateur international with stellar achievements before embarking on a successful career as a professional.

In time I would meet the family, one which is steeped in golfing tradition with his dad, Johan, becoming commissioner (a most successful one) of the Sunshine Tour and his brother, Mark, a highly-rated teaching pro.

Johan Immelman built a bunker and green at the family home (just as Neels Els had for Ernie) and set about supporting a golfing habit that even at a young age Trevor defined as wanting to be “the best golfer in the world.”

His triumphal march at Augusta, which I’m sure caused quite a few tears to be shed alongside the 18th green and before television sets back home in South Africa, has elevated him to a different level.

With the addition of that one title a career that showed one victory in America (the 2006 Western Open), five international wins (the 2000 Vodacom Players Championship, 2003 South African Airways Open, 2004 SAA Open, 2004 Deutsche Bank-SAP Open and 2007 Nedbank Challenge) and a triumph in the World Cup (with Rory Sabbatini) in 2003, has been converted into a great one.

In his early years Immelman had a reputation for being cocky – I once wrote that for him golf was clearly not a popularity contest – but he has grown up, matured, and his magnanimity and humbleness in victory made one proud to be South African.

Immelman’s hero and mentor has always been Gary Player – indeed there is a distinct similarity in their build, in their determination and appetite for hard work – and he has spoken of the inspiration of a telephone message left for him on the night before the final round at Augusta.

However, it was another act by Player that engineered a massive boost to Immelman’s career.

By including Immelman as a captain’s pick in his President’s Cup team in 2005 (having somewhat surprisingly left him out when the match was staged at The Links in Fancourt in 2003) Player, in effect, handed his young protégé the biggest chance of his life – a chance Immelman would grab with both hands.

One of the perks of being a President’s Cup team member was automatic entry into a number of U.S. PGA Tour events thus enabling Immelman to circumvent the arduous tour school.

There were grumblings among the Americans at the time because it was felt Immelman had not qualified for the President’s Cup team but he silenced those in 2006 by winning the Western Open; going on to become the Rookie of the Year, the first rookie since Jerry Pate (1976) to finish 10th or better on the season-ending money list.

Player is fond of reminding one that “you make your luck” and Immelman showed he had taken the message to heart when he converted his next big break by winning last year’s Nedbank Challenge at Sun City.

Immelman had not even been in the field, getting in with just days to go to tee-off when Sergio Garcia withdrew, but his facing down of Justin Rose in an event that has the feel of a Major - given the intense television scrutiny, the size of the crowds, the magnitude of the purse and the pressures on South African competitors - by his own admission stood him in good stead as he held his nerve on what is always a harrowing final day at Augusta.

Now he owns one of the most coveted items in sport – a Masters green jacket – and also boasts the not inconsiderable feat that both his American wins have listed, in second place, the name of one T.WOODS.

That alone tells you something of his temperament and that as South Africa’s fifth Major champion he will not be backing off should the chance again present itself on the final day of a U.S. Open or British Open.

He has certainly made his luck.

P.S. 20 years on from first meeting Trevor Immelman, Dan Retief has still not had a hole-in-one.