Tee time comes most every day for ‘Lucky’ Lacaillade
On New Year’s Eve, many of us will be putting on our party faces. Eugene “Lucky” Lacaillade will be playing his 360th round of golf this year.
On New Year’s Day, many of us will be swallowing aspirin and watching football. Lacaillade will be doing fairways and greens again. There are 365 days in a year, and little interrupts his daily march to the first tee.
“I only miss for bad weather or fishing,” he says.
Lacaillade’s golfing is more a “Ripley’s Believe It or Not” than a Cal Ripken milestone. He is not a publicity hound, looking for attention. He didn’t seek us. We found him.
He is 65, lives in Sun City, an Inland Empire area that has now mostly been taken over by the city of Menifee. He is no hopeless duffer. He plays to a 10.2 handicap and got it down to 5.6 a few years ago. He still plays from the blue tees, can still drive it 250 to 260 yards off the tee and can read the greens better than ever now after recent Lasik eye surgery.
He smokes about a pack and a half of cigarettes a day but says he quit drinking years ago.
“I guess I traded one addiction for another,” he says.
He likes to play alone because he can sometimes get around the 18 holes in less than two hours. But he also has a set of golfing friends at the strangely named California Golf & Art Country Club in Sun City,