The late, great legless golfer Eddie Urquhart inspired many, and his spirit was in full swing at Variety Village on the weekend.
Big Eddie, of Courtice, once smoked a drive 347 yards at a Las Vegas meet. For most of us hackers, that’s a Big Bertha, a long iron, and maybe a foot wedge.
Dylan Foulds, 13, would be hard-pressed to walk 347 yards without a rest. He has cerebral palsy. Mini-putt is his speed. But golf is a father-son game, and he’d like to join his dad, Michael, as more than a cart buddy. “I’d really enjoy that,” he says. “This is for both of us,” says his dad.
So, Dylan is on a practice tee at a Variety clinic.
Regular readers know the Village is a sports complex in Scarborough tailored for kids with disabilities. It is known for para-swimming, wheelchair basketball, and such. Golf, not so much, until now.
The weekend clinic is tucked into the back of the sprawling fieldhouse. The common golf question, “What’s your handicap?” has uncommon meaning here.
Two kids are in wheelchairs. Two instructors are minus an arm, including Ken Mulgrew, whose right one got caught in a garbage truck on a part-time job when he was 16. “Best thing that ever happened to me,” says Mulgrew, 61, who went back to school and is a retired high school vice-principal. He’s with ParaGolf Ontario.
“We have scratch golfers with one arm, guys with dwarfism, guys with one leg. We have people with CP who shake except for that one second when they hit the ball — and they’ll beat you and me both.”
Which brings us back to young Dylan Foulds. He had surgery at age six to ease tension in his legs and level his stance, but CP still affects his movement, even his voice, though not his wit.
Golf, he says, is fine, but “I prefer sports with a little more drama.” Such as soccer. Or Lego-building. “It helps strengthen my hands.” I suppose if darts are a sport, so is Lego.
Dylan is a Village kid mostly to swim. So far, golf has meant shadowing his dad at driving ranges or on golf carts. Next summer, perhaps, he’ll take a few swings, too.
“Dylan’s doing great for his first time,” says instructor Kenny Wittmann, 26, who can empathize. Wittmann, too, has CP. He was a preemie. Now, he sometimes cracks the top 100 in world rankings among para golfers and is apprentice pro at Glencairn Golf Club in Milton. He just won a dedication award named for Eddie Urquhart, who lost his legs in a motorcycle crash.
Wittmann was Dylan’s age when he first swung a club. “It kept going straight. That’s my game. Short and straight.”
Same here, pal, except for the straight part.
Meanwhile, Dylan is starting to make contact with the foam practice balls. Not 347-yard contact, but contact is contact.
“These kids just want to try things out,” Wittmann says. “Today, we’re working on Dylan’s motor skills. Can we make a grip with his hands, can we make a swing for him?”
Next tee over, Todd Keirstead, who is the guru of para golf in Canada, works with a kid named Kingston, 6, who has spina bifida and is paralyzed from the ribs down.
Kingston’s face lights up every time he hits the ball. His mom says, “He saw the poster (for the clinic) and said, “Golf sticks!’”
Kingston could hit the course one day, says Keirstead, who founded ParaGolf Canada. His students include Ryan Straschnitzki, who was paralyzed in the Humboldt Bronco bus wreck but is now driving the ball 140 off the tee.
Keirstead says, “There are adaptive golf carts. They can actually play real golf — but in an adaptive way. It’s not about the rules of the game. It’s about their game.”
CP, spina bifida, paralysis. And you thought your slice was an obstacle.
As Tiger Woods once said: “I smile at obstacles.”
northchannelmike@gmail.com
How to help
Keep the kids of Variety Village swinging or swimming or whatever else helps them be their best. See promo ads periodically in the Toronto Sun or donate direct at sunchristmasfund.ca. There, or at mikestrobel.ca, you can also order my new book, Small Miracles: The Inspiring Kids of Variety Village, all proceeds of which go to the fund.
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