Q-School--crunch time for every starry-eyed rookie and wizened veteran who wants to play their way to, or return to, the big time, the PGA Tour--is here again. It's a tough road and it's a long one.
The first three stages--pre-qualifying, first stage and second stage--consist of 72-hole tournaments. The pre-qualifying stage, which is for players with no prior history of competition, took place in mid-September. We are now up to the second stage which began on Tuesday.
This week the pressure builds to yip-inducing intensity as PGA TOUR members who finished outside the top 150 on the 2010 money list will join the competition and will be desperate to keep their cards. For example, two-time PGA TOUR winner Daniel Chopra is among those entered at the Southern Hills Plantation Club event.
Not Your Ordinary School
Q School is not a traditional school, but there is a classroom where the lessons can both scar and save you. There are no teachers who will pass you just to get you to the next grade. Your teachers are the course, your competitors and yourself. And the mantra for many competitors is try, try, try again. And that's why the stories from Q School are so rich. The dream never dies as long as you can swing a club.
When it's all over and the final putt has been blown or made, the still-standing survivors will have earned their PGA TOUR cards for the 2011 season and their lives will never be the same.
December Is the Decider
In the first stage, tournaments were held on 13 different courses across the country over two weeks. A set number of players from each first stage event then advanced to one of six second-stage venues. The second-stage survivors will then move on to the final stage at Orange County National in Winter Garden, Fla., and commence the final march to fulfilling their dreams Dec. 1-6.
That finale is a marathon of golf contested over six rounds--108 gut-twisting, OMG holes--that determines whether a player goes home to dwell on what might have been or advances either to the Nationwide Tour or, as one of the low 25 finishers, are exempt on the PGA TOUR for 2011.
One of the best books about Q School, "Q School Confidential: Inside Golf's Cruelest Tournament," was written by David Gould, former Links Magazine Editor, and currently an editor for GolfCourseHome.
Here's this week's schedule:
Tuesday, Nov. 16, 2010
Round 1 Redstone, Humble TX
Wednesday, Nov. 17, 2010
Round 1 Southern Hills Plantation, Jacksonville, FL
Round 1 Hombre Golf Club, Panama City Beach, FL
Round 1 Bear Creek Golf Club, Dallas-Ft. Worth, TX
Round 1 TPC Craig Ranch, McKinney, TX
Round 1 Bayonet Course, Seaside, CA
