Golfer Galvon stays cool to scorch the competition
30-year-old from Cottonwood captures Calgary Golf Association City Amateur
Calm, cool and collecting trophies.
Cottonwood’s Jesse Galvon surged to a five-stroke victory at the Calgary Golf Association’s City Amateur, continuing a stellar run of results since nearly losing his leg two years ago after a freak golf-cart incident in foul weather.
“It kind of took that dramatic incident to open my eyes to how important the mental side of golf is and it just made me so much more mentally strong,” Galvon said after Sunday’s final round on Glencoe’s Forest Course, one of two venues for the four-day city showdown.
“I started playing at two years old, and my dad has been my best friend and coach from the very beginning. He tried, he tried to put it in my head how to stay calm out there. It’s not like I was a hothead, going crazy, but I would more get fired up inside with myself and really get going.
“All those lessons that he taught and all that stuff, it took this weird incident — almost losing my leg and spending two weeks in the hospital … It took all of that for me to really say, ‘If I just ever get a chance to play again, I promise I’ll keep a cool head.’ I kind of made a pact with myself.
“And mentally, this is probably the best my game has ever been.” The results prove it. Galvon won the Calgary Golf Association’s Player of the Year race in 2017 and, although his leg is still sore after every round, now has his name on another significant piece of hardware.
The 30-year-old posted a fourday tally of 8-under 280 at the 101st City Amateur, firing rounds of 67 and 72 at Elbow Springs, then following up with a 70 and 71 during weekend action on Glencoe’s demanding Forest Course.
He closed Sunday with nine hohum pars on the back nine, never providing a glimmer of hope for the chase pack.
Gerry Macdonald (Inglewood) and Jamie Welder (Country Hills) shared runner-up honours at 3-under 285.
“This is probably one of the last Calgary Golf Association tournaments — junior and amateur — that I hadn’t won that I always kind of wanted to win,” Galvon said. “So I’m really excited about that. It means a lot to me.”
Galvon could easily have more tournament victories to show for this summer.
He lost the final of the City Match Play in dramatic fashion, with Welder forcing a playoff with an eagle on No. 18 and then draining a 50-footer on the first extra hole.
Galvon was a staggering 17-under-par at the Sun Life Financial Alberta Amateur Championship, but St. Albert’s A.J. Armstrong was two strokes better.
This past week, Galvon was finally rewarded. He made a tournamentleading 19 birdies at the City Amateur. What’s perhaps most telling is how he shrugged off one of his 11 bogeys.
“Yesterday, I hit one into No. 9 — I was 2-under at the time — and it hit a rake right beside the fringe,” Galvon said. “It would have popped right up to the green, probably to about 10 or 15 feet, but it hit the rake in a really weird position and bounced back 40 yards, and I ended up making bogey. The old me probably would have got really fired up, but I just settled in and said, ‘That’s one bad break. That’s golf.’
“I kept a cool head, and I think that was my key all week. All summer, actually.”
CHIP SHOTS
Calgary’s Jaclyn Lee (Glencoe) earned a late invite to the 118th U.S. Women’s Amateur Championship as an alternate and the 21-year-old certainly made the most of the opportunity, finishing fourth in the stroke-play portion, then winning three matches before being eliminated in the quarter-final round … Riley Fleming (National Golf Academy) topped the leaderboard at the PGA of Alberta’s Assistants Championship, scorching to a tworound total of 9-under 133 at The Ranch. Fleming, 25, leads the Order of Merit standings and will be among the favourites when the top club and teaching pros from around the province meet next week in Red Deer for the PGA of Alberta Championship … The Calgary Senior Ladies Amateur is on tap TuesdayWednesday at The Winston. The defending champion is Kerrin Lee- Gartner (Pinebrook), famous as Canada’s golden downhiller at the 1992 Albertville Olympics.
It’s not like I was a hothead, going crazy, but I would more get fired up inside with myself and really get going.