HER name was Ally and she was just a face in the surprisingly large gallery of friends and well-wishers walking with Jimmy Douris in the second round of the Queensland Open at Pelican Waters last week.
But Ally was there for a purpose – to show her support for a remarkable young man who has been her golf coach and friend for nearly five years. As she kept pace with Jimmy and his caddie, striding positively down the centre of the lush seventh fairway, she crossed her fingers and mouthed what sounded almost like a prayer.
“I want so much for him to make the cut,” she said. “Anything else would be a bonus. Just make the cut, Jimmy.”
The man she was supporting was Noosa Golf Club’s immensely likeable head teaching pro Jimmy Douris, a diminutive 40-year-old clad in a pair of shorts and a daggy sun hat – seemingly out of place, in some ways, in this elite state golf championship.
But that didn’t matter to Ally and the rest of the spectators, most of them Noosa members whose life Jimmy has touched in one way or another.
“He’s rebuilt my swing, given me back my confidence and changed my life,” said Ally. “And he’s done that for so many golfers. He’s just so invested.”
Jimmy is a living, breathing fairy-tale, and most of the members at Noosa know his story.
A decade ago Jimmy was in the US following his dream of becoming a touring professional, mixing tournament play with coaching would-be American golfers.
So good was he that he was a four-time champion of the US Golf Teachers Cup – an event that brings together the nation’s best golf teachers and coaches.
One day, though, he woke with a swollen neck. Initially thought to be an infection, the ailment was later diagnosed as lymphoma. Devastated, Jimmy flew home and began a course of chemotherapy, which at first failed. About the same time he lost both his parents.
But Jimmy Douris is nothing if not a fighter. A second round of chemo, combined with a bone marrow transplant and lots of support from family and friends, saw him eventually become cancer-free.
“I needed to pay bills, so I started teaching again which helped change my perspective, and ultimately my life,” he said.
He took over responsibility for the Noosa junior pennant team, coaching the kids, taking them to matches, walking beside them as they competed in junior tournaments, and supporting them in whatever way he could.
They thrived under his coaching and there’s no doubt it was Jimmy’s influence that saw Noosa’s junior pennant squad – and, indeed, the seniors – become the region’s dominant team.
But Jimmy Douris doesn’t play tournament golf himself. Not until this week anyway.
“I hadn’t played in the Queensland Open since it was last held at Nudgee more than 20 years ago,” he said. “That was before I went to the US. I was a pretty good young player back then.”
He spent just a fortnight practicing and preparing – “I even did some stretching,” he joked, miming touching his toes – and signed up for an 18-hole pre-qualifying event at Brisbane’s Virginia golf course.
Why go all the way to Brisbane when he could have played in a similar event at Pelican Waters on the same day? Jimmy flashed his trademark lopsided grin, pointed to his head and replied: “Because I’m smart.”
He knew the cream of the Sunshine Coast’s golfing talent – including a cohort of outstanding young amateurs from his own Noosa academy – would be playing at Pelican Waters. The pickings at Virginia would be easier, he figured.
And so it proved. Courtesy of an eagle along the way and a birdie on the very last hole, Jimmy shot two-under-par 70, and pinched the final place in the field.
He made the most of it. With one of his protégées, Noosa junior Tamatoa Stansfield, pulling his clubs, Jimmy sauntered around the Pelican Waters course four times – yes, Ally’s prayers were answered and Jimmy made the 36-hole cut after early rounds of 71 and 70 – wisecracking with friends, swapping jokes with fellow pros, and thoroughly enjoying himself.
He didn’t win; didn’t even make the top 30. But that didn’t matter. If anything, his efforts over those four days only enhanced his legend.
He showed everybody that he didn’t just teach golf; he could play it, too – play it at the very highest of levels. And that, given the chance, he could compete with the best.
“I feel great,” Jimmy said after the final round. “I played well and had a wonderful time. It’s an honour to be contesting my state championship.”
For the record, he shot rounds of 71, 70, 73 and 71 for a four-round total of three-under-par 285 – 15 strokes behind winner, Sydney’s Andrew Evans, but good enough for tied 50th in the elite field.
New clubs the key to Jeff’s victory
The Japanese golf club manufacturer XXIO (pronounced zek-si-oh) aims its products not at the elite golfer, but at the average player – older men and women, in the main, whose swing speed has slowed over the years and who can’t hit the ball great distances.
The theory obviously pays off. XXIO has been the premier golf club brand in Japan for 17 straight years, and is also No 1 in Korea and New Zealand.
If Noosa Springs’ Jeff Forbes is any indication, it may soon be top of the pops in Australia as well.
Jeff, a former chief financial officer for the global infrastructure and environmental services company Cardno, and now a semi-retired company director, bought a set of XXIO clubs in December, and hasn’t looked back.
Last week he breezed around Noosa Springs in the Monday competition, scoring 40 stableford points and registering a comfortable win. Included in his round were wipes on two holes. A week earlier he had a 39-point game.
“The clubs have certainly helped me,” said Jeff, who has deliberately sought to slow his swing.
A golfer for 30 years and Noosa Springs member for three, Jeff tries to hit the fairways three times a week, and says he’s now close to being on his lowest ever handicap.
5 clubs is just fine at Cooroy
Cooroy vets playing in last week’s Wednesday competition were required to use just five clubs each in their two-man Ambrose event. And, judging by the scores, most of them chose very well.
The winning pair carded a most respectable nett 61, and many players were muttering after the game about why they needed 14 clubs to play good golf.
Two teams, however, were disqualified for not recording the number of drives taken by each player, and it was interesting that the winners, Bronco Price and Kerry Davies, and the runners-up, Brett LeMoy and Don Esposito, all played in the last group to finish.
Hurry to make Skins field
Spots are filling fast for Noosa Springs’ Skins Series on Wednesday, March 31.
The first of four such events scheduled for 2021, it’s a skins-type team event with a prize of four bottles of wine for the best stableford score by a team on each hole. If two or more teams get the same score on a hole, the prize jackpots to the next hole.
The cost is $85 ($39 for members) and that includes lunch and post-game nibbles. Tee-off is at 12 noon.
Club competitions
NOOSA
Monday, 8 March
Women’s stableford: A grade – Jeannie Dodds 37, Glenys Healey 35c/b; B grade – Jane Peterson 41, Marilyn Leslie 37. Women’s 9-hole stableford: Jenny Drummond-Gower 21, Elisabeth Thomson 19, Barb Allen 18.
Tuesday, 9 March
Men’s stableford: A grade – Justin Morgan 44, Murray McMillan 39, Darren Weatherby-Blythe 38c/b, Clinton Stjernqvist 38c/b; B grade – Michael Norman 41, Brad Edwards 40, John Henry 39c/b, Kenny Lindsay 39; C grade – Dave Wellington 42, Greg Kuch 40, Bert Hofer 38c/b, Peter Wright 38c/b.
Wednesday, 10 March
Vets stableford: Mike Quincey 43, Michael Norman 39, Edmond Bonnici 37; B grade – Peter McDonald 39, Terry Farrell 36, John Brodie 35c/b; C grade – John Eldridge 39c/b, Martin Taylor 39; Brenton Ross 36c/b.
NOOSA SPRINGS
Monday, 8 March
Men’s stableford: Jeff Forbes 40, Jeffrey Pearce 38c/b, Chris Collinge 38.
Tuesday, 9 March
Men’s stableford: Josh Constable 39, John Taylor 36, Kurt Haensch 35; women’s stableford: Carrie Pleasance 36, Nicola Minchin 34, Margot McKellar 31.
Wednesday, 10 March
Men’s stableford: Noel Telfer 41, Joost Wamsteeker 39, Robert Mayfield 38; women’s stableford: Shard Lorenzo 35, Diana Goss 34, Mally Jane 32c/b.
Saturday, 13 March
Men’s stableford: Paul Liddy 39, Andrew Seal 38, Chris Collinge 37c/b; women’s stableford: Judy Buss 41, Fran McLaughlin 40, Coco Moore 37c/b.
Sunday, 14 March
Men’s Universal Property Sunday Series, stableford: Raffi Sekzenian 41, Thomas Ashton 35c/b, Greg Taylor 35; women: Sandi Hoskins 37, Dianna Goss 34, Judy Buss 33.
COOROY
Tuesday, 9 March
Women’s stableford (9 holes): Mary Miller 17, Beatrice Bruin 16.
Wednesday, 10 March
Vets 2-man Ambrose: Bronco Price & Kerry Davies 61, Brett LeMoy & Don Esposito 61.25, Richard Gibson & David Tink 63.
Thursday, 11 March
Women’s stableford: Judy Kitcher 34, Kate Sawrey 33.
Saturday, 13 March
Men’s stableford: Div 1 – N. Ackland 37c/b, R. Gibson 37; Div 2 – S. Bennett 45, P. Jeucken 39; Div 3 – A. Jones 37, T. Foster 34; women’s stableford: Carole Clancy 34, Janelle Thorburn 31.
