Five golfers who had the world at their feet, only to disappear off the map ...

THERE has never been a better time to be a talented young golfer in South Africa. We have so many fantastic young players plying their trade on the professional golf tours overseas.

The hardest part for most of these youngsters must be the decisions that need to be made as to which route they want to follow to make their dream a reality. If you’re approaching the end of your schooling and your golf is of a standard where you’ve been playing provincial golf, and your ultimate dream is to play professional golf, well, what is the best way to get there?

South Africa is a great “stomping ground” for amateurs. There are a host of really competitive provincial golf tournaments and the SAGA is proactive in sending the top players to compete on the world stage in all the top amateur events. Players like Ernie Els, Retief Goosen, Charl Schwartzel and Louis Oost- huizen decided to stay in South Africa, play amateur golf and take all the opportunities that the SAGA could offer them. You’d have to imagine that with golf returning to the Olympics in 2016, there are going to be more fantastic opportunities opening up for amateur golfers.

There is also the option of going to college in America. This is the path that Tim Clark and Rory Sabbatini followed, and Dylan Frittelli, one of our best amateurs, is currently the top college golfer in America. There have, however, been many other young South Africans who have taken the college route and not succeeded. Some of them elected to stay and live in the United States, moving into other areas of golf. A good example is Robert Baker, who is now one of the top teachers in the world.

What concerns me about the American college system is that winning is of paramount importance to the colleges, so they don’t try to improve your golf. They just want their players to get points on the board. Very often golfers leave college with the same swing faults or general golf faults that they started with.

A third option is to attend one of the schools that have opened up in South Africa that concentrate on golf. Examples are Kenako in George or The Golf School of Excellence in Gauteng, which offer both golf and study options. The study option forms part of the PGA Apprenticeship Programme, which is now recognised worldwide and is ideal if you see your future as being in the golf business.

Then there’s the option of turning pro and playing in South Africa. There are now two mini-tours plus the Sunshine Tour’s “Winter Tour”, so that’s three different opportunities for young stay-at-home professionals to learn to play pro golf.

For most young “wannabe” golfers, I’d recommend the route of the study option, where they try to see how good their golf gets during that time, but at least after three years, they have something to fall back on. For top players like Brandon Stone and Haydn Porteous, I would definitely recommend playing the amateur circuit fulltime for a year or two before turning professional and then following the same road that Charl and Louis did.

Probably the best piece of advice I can give is to make sure that you are in the right teaching hands. Gavan Levenson has his Golf Academy at Glendower Golf Club in Johannesburg where many of the top young South African golfers learn to play the game at a high level.

Ashleigh Simon, James Kamte and even Charl Schwartzel spent time with Gavan. It was Lee Trevino who said, “Give me a golf teacher that can beat me, and I’ll listen to him.” Well, that’s a bit harsh, perhaps because if he could beat Trevino, he’d be playing and not teaching, but I do think it’s important that the teacher has played tournament golf.

David Leadbetter, Butch Harmon and Phil Ritson were all tournament players, and that’s the big advantage that Gavan Levenson has. He’s been a winner, so he is able to impart the knowledge of what it takes to win and succeed, on to his students.

An interesting 19th-hole topic of conversation is always why some golfers get to the top of the world and then drop off, never to be seen again. Here are five who remain a mystery to me:

1: Tiger’s buddy at Stanford was Notah Begay. He won four tournaments in his first year on Tour, then injured his back and has dropped from 19th in the world to an unranked position, with no card to play on any Tour.

2: No golfer has ever had a career to match Michael Campbell’s. Up and down like a yo-yo. He looked really good as a youngster when he came on to the European Tour from New Zealand. He won a few tournaments around the world, then his golf game went awol. In 2005, he started improving, then won the US Open, but by 2008, he was off the map again. He’s hardly playing now.

3: Chip Beck once shot a 59 on the PGA Tour. He played in the Nedbank Golf Challenge and for two years was in the Top 10 in the world rankings. He was the runner-up in the 1993 Masters, then suddenly lost his game when he began changing his swing to get more distance. After missing 46 cuts in a row, he eventually started selling insurance. The good news is that he is back on the Champions Tour and playing well again.

4: David Duval was the No 1 golfer in the world when he won the Open Championship in 2001. Soon after that, his game went spiralling down to a point where he hasn’t finished in the Top 125 for 10 years. He did have one mystery tournament in that period where he finished second in the 2009 US Open.

5: Ian Baker-finch, another Open Champion, won in 1991 and has never won again. In fact, he hardly ever made another cut. It was also the quest for more distance off the tee that was to blame. Eventually, a 92 in in the first round of the 1997 Open convinced him to quit Tour golf.

It was the “Voice of Golf” Denis Hutchinson’s 80th birthday on Wednesday. He is a marvel. He breaks his age every time he plays, he works and travels overseas and is the life and soul of the 19th hole. When it comes to golf, golf tournaments, results and people in the game, don’t take any chances, because he will correct you. His memory is incredible for all things golf. Happy birthday, Hutch!

Most golfers aren’t entirely honest about their golf. I suppose we would all like to think that we are good strikers of the ball. So obviously, a bad score can only be attributed to bad putting. Be realistic about your golf. Know your strengths and weaknesses. Count how many fairways you hit and how many greens. Did you miss them left or right? How was your chipping or bunker play? After a few rounds, you’ll see a pattern, and you’ll know exactly what areas you need to work on. Then visit your PGA pro and spend 15 minutes working on those specific areas. Your lessons will also be better because you can give the pro better information.