Golfer Hoping Lifelong Dream Will Become Reality
Bruce Benedict told two generations of students to follow their dreams. Now he’s taking his own advice.
The Mead Junior High English teacher is quitting his job next month to golf full-time, training to join the Senior PGA tour in two years.
No worries about regular paychecks, professional ego or stability. Benedict says he’s pursuing the “grandest vision of myself.”
“People that see the hazards, obstacles, that say, don’t go there, might be dooming themselves to that,” said Benedict, 48.
He knows odds are long that he can make the tour, but faced with a career juncture and the nagging call of his lifelong dream, Benedict stopped hesitating.
“Golf and life are so similar in that they create choices. In life, having fear will create choices for yourself,” said Benedict. “People that are fearful, that look in terms of impossibilities, probably never make it past their fear.”
He’s flirted with trying to join the regular PGA tour since graduating from Hawaii’s Chaminade College, where he was a par golfer. But he says he wasn’t good enough then, mentally or physically.
He’s now found a golf zen, a green place where he “loves every moment” on the course. A former Sunday school teacher who now endorses many Buddhist views, Benedict says he has no expectations except to become his best.
And he has a two handicap playing at local courses like Wandermere and Stoneridge and at tournaments like the Liberty Lake Amatuer. He plays regularly, but enters just a few tournaments each year.
Just 16 new players qualify for the Senior PGA tour each year, and staying in the lucrative golf nirvana is difficult. Players must land on the top 30 in earnings to win an exemption from qualifying for next year. Rick Acton, in 31st place, won $445,000 this year.
Benedict figures his best golf - he’s shot 4 under at the Liberty Lake and Idaho State Amatuer tournaments - is good enough. He just has be consistent.
He’ll do that, he says, by playing tournaments in Hawaii, where he has a summer house. He’ll have to pass a qualifying school to join the tour.
Benedict’s wife, Kate, and friends endorse the leap.
“For him to take that kind of step, to step out of a comfortable living, to fulfill a dream, that’s pretty respectable,” said Don Beloved, another Mead Junior High teacher and fellow golfer.
“I don’t know if I would be as daring as Bruce.”
Benedict acknowledges his financial uncertainty. His wife is a Group Health manager, and they have no college-aged children.
They have a ranch home on 10 acres in Colbert and a summer place in Hawaii, where Benedict plans to stay while playing tournaments.
Something good will happen, he says. “The element of fear in my life is gone,” said Benedict.
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo