Sophomore James Erkenbeck has taken eight years to make his interest in playing golf into more than just a fun hobby — now he’s looking to go professional. “There was a golf course close to my house, and all of my friends and I just decided to play for fun,” Erkenbeck said. “And then I just got a passion for it, and I’ve stuck with it since I was 12.”
And he’s been successful. The fall season is over, and Erkenbeck finished his third straight tournament with a top-10 finish in the Baylor Intercollegiate, which concluded on Tuesday.
Erkenbeck was also a longtime soccer player, but he realized during his freshman year in high school that he was steadily losing interest in the sport.
He tried being a dual athlete, playing both soccer and golf, but he said he had to choose between the game he played his whole life and the one he liked and casually picked as a hobby.
He said he is happy with his decision to play golf. Head coach Glen Millican said he couldn’t agree more. “James is a hard worker who is continuing to improve,” he said. “The main thing he’s improved on is his patience, which has allowed him to get the most out of his game.”
Erkenbeck, who grew up in San Diego, said the decision to change sports was easy — simply, California is full of lush golf courses, so he had easy access to play. And he has top-notch facilities, at UNM, too, he said. “The golf program here is one of the top in the country and the practice facilities are great,” Erkenbeck said. “Since I want to become a professional golfer, there are not too many places better to prepare myself.”
Maintaining the motivation needed to compete at a high level is one of the hardest parts of playing, Erkenbeck said, even though golf breeds a competitive atmosphere. The reason: golf is almost exclusively an individual, self-paced sport. “You’re pretty much out there by yourself most of the time,” Erkenbeck said. “It’s difficult because sometimes the better player doesn’t win tournaments, because he may not have the same direction like other guys.”
But Erkenbeck said going out alone, day after day, to practice his swings and his putting is only half the battle.
The other half is the grueling schedule.
Whether there is a tournament or not, Erkenbeck said that golf takes up at least half of his days and the other half is used to keep up his grades.
“We’ll have team workouts from 7 to 8 a.m. Then we’ll go to school from about 9 a.m. to noon, grab some lunch and then head out to the course from 1 p.m. until the sun goes down and then the rest of the night is used to do homework,” he said. “Tournament days are just as tough. We have to get out to the course a couple days before for our practice rounds and normally we’ll be out there from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. It makes for some long days.” Erkenbeck said he has been playing well, but he still needs to continue working on the technical aspects of his game.
He has already mastered another aspect of the game, through a superstitious ritual he uses before he heads to the golf course for a tournament. “I always mark my golf ball the same way,” he said. “I draw a line over part of the golf ball to line up the hole for where I’m trying to aim it, but then sometimes I cover up the number because I’m pretty superstitious about that. I like the number eight, so I’ll mark off the number and draw a red eight on it.”
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