Scottish golfer’s friendship with CdA Tribe results in pro career

At the time, it seemed like little more than a unique and nifty cultural exchange built around the sport of golf.

But for Jimmy Gunn, the friendly Ryder Cup-style matches that played out in September 2005 at Circling Raven Golf Club, and pitted his team from Dornoch, Scotland, against the Coeur d’Alene Tribe’s host team, proved to be the Gateway to a dream.

Gunn, an accomplished amateur at the time, and his teammates from the world-renowned Royal Dornoch Golf Club made the long trip from Scotland to Worley, Idaho, as guests of the Coeur d’Alene Tribe and spent several days exploring the region and engaging in a friendly international golf competition that was the first of its kind.

The host team ended up winning those matches, but the outcome mattered little.

That get-together was more about establishing new friendships and learning more about a different culture than it was about competition.

Members of the Scottish team maintained contact with their Native American friends after returning home following the matches. But the 27-year-old Gunn managed to parlay his newly cultivated relationship with the Coeur d’Alene Tribe into a professional golf career when the Coeur d’Alene Casino Resort Hotel and Circling Raven Golf Club agreed this spring to sponsor him on the Desert Summer Series of the Gateway Tour.

“Jimmy is a product of Dornoch, and that says a great deal,” Dave LaSarte-Meeks, chief executive officer for the Coeur d’Alene Casino Resort Hotel, said back in May when it was announced that the casino and golf course had agreed to pay Gunn’s summer entry fees in the Gateway Tour. “We know he has tremendous talent and potential.

“We also know he has the quality and character that extends from a good family and his roots in Sutherland in the Scottish Highlands.”

In exchange for the Coeur d’Alene Tribe generous sponsorship, Gunn has agreed to serve as Circling Raven’s first playing professional.

“I believe this is a great opportunity for Jimmy, but also a great opportunity for us here at Circling Raven,” Tom Davis, the course’s director of golf, said in an earlier statement announcing the partnership. “From a business standpoint, this puts our name out there again among professionals and fans.

“We have a fine young man to cheer for, and we are unique among courses in the region to have a playing professional as part of the Circling Raven crew.”

Unfortunately for Gunn, life on the Gateway Tour has proven to be anything but cushy. He has missed the cut in all four summer events he has entered, after earning eight checks worth a total of $10,176.51 during the tour’s Desert Winter and Desert Spring series.

“I’ve struggled a little bit, mainly because I’m not familiar with any of the courses we’re playing,” Gunn said in a Friday telephone interview, shortly after missing the cut at this week’s Gateway Tour stop at Desert Mountain Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz. “A lot of the players down here are from here, and they play these courses all the time.”

The personable Gunn has also endured some visa problems and weather shock since qualifying for the Gateway Tour. Because he has yet to secure a permanent visa, he must return to Scotland every 90 days and renew his temporary one – an inconvenience that cuts deeply into both his tour routine and wallet.

“The trips back home are expensive,” Gunn said. “It’s an 11-hour flight, so that’s not good, either. And because I don’t have a visa, I don’t have a credit rating.”

That means he’s paying about $1,000 a week for a rental car.

The scorching Arizona weather has also presented some problems.

“I’m trying hard to deal with it,” Gunn said, “but its hard playing in 115-degree temperatures when I’m used to playing back home when its 60 degrees.”

Still, Gunn remains immensely – and understandably – grateful to the Coeur d’Alene Tribe for helping finance his dream, which he hopes will eventually earn him a spot on the PGA Tour.

“It’s difficult to express what it means to me,” he said of the sponsorship. “(Professional golf) is a pretty expensive business when you’re first starting out, and I probably couldn’t afford to still be here if it wasn’t for them.”

Gunn, noting that a close friend has been making a living on minitours in the United State for almost 10 years, hasn’t set a timetable for making it to the PGA Tour.

“Years ago, you couldn’t make a living on these kinds of tours,” he said. “But if you do well on the Gateway Tour, you can. So as long as I’m doing OK, I’ll keep going.”

Gunn has yet to return to Circling Raven since signing his sponsorship contract, but he said he hopes to make it back later this fall and conduct some clinics for young golfers.

“But after all they’ve done for me, I’ll do anything they want me to do,” he said.