A Hallberg Moment

How Gary got his card.

Some might consider it almost too good a story, a sentimental reminder more suited for a greeting card than the sports pages. Gary Hallberg, a one-time can’t miss kid who played for legendary coach Jesse Haddock at Wake Forest University, blazes through a Sunday afternoon just a few miles up the road from his storied alma mater. He fires a course-record 61, shoots up the leaderboard and holds off Champions Tour superstars Fred Couples and Bernhard Langer, overcoming years of doubts and insecurities in the process.

A Hallmark moment, no doubt. But that’s how it happened last fall at the Ensure Classic at Rock Barn Resort. Today, Gary Hallberg is done looking back. More important, he has much to look forward to: a one-year exemption on the Champions Tour, a more secure future both financially and psychologically and competing with a deeper belief that more trips to the winner’s circle are in store.

That kind of view of the future is a far cry from what Hallberg was thinking just a year ago, when he was beginning to wonder if it was still worth it. He had conditional status on the Champions Tour but no real control over his schedule and no real sense of movement in his game or his career.

“It was a long, hard, climb to be honest with you,” he confessed in a recent phone interview from Phoenix, where he was preparing for the start of the Champions Tour season. “I was really under-employed, and it was frustrating. You prepare and you prepare. And you know you can do it. And then you don’t get into the next tournament. That wears on you. Preparation is tough, and when the rug keeps getting snatched out from under you…”

After two rounds of the Ensure Classic at Rock Barn last fall, life after golf still played a major role in his thinking. The next day, however, after a putting tip from his friend Nick Price and with instructor and friend Mike McGetrick on his bag, Gary Hallberg made up his mind.

“It was one of those wins that just kind of happens,” McGetrick said. To tell you the truth, the goal was a top ten. We were out a couple of groups ahead of the leaders, and I think that took some of the pressure off and let Gary just ride the wave he was on. And I’ll tell you, as good as that 61 was, he left two or three shots out there.”

For Hallberg, the victory earned $262,000, by far the largest payday of his 30-year career. But it meant much more than that.

“It changes everything,” Hallberg says. “I was only eligible for 16 or 17 of the 25 events out here. It’s tough to make the top 30 on the money list (which carries an automatic exemption) that way. Now I know I’m going to be playing. That changes the way you prepare, the way you feel about the sacrifices your family making so you can play golf. It really does change everything.”  

They say that nothing shines inside a man so much as great potential. Much is expected of those who have it. And those who have it expect much of themselves. But a once-bright future can cast a long shadow of a past. Now, with his most satisfying season of professional golf behind him—at age 52—Hallberg has received the gift of living in the present.

Gary Hallberg stormed onto the PGA TOUR in 1980 after completing an astonishing collegiate career. For four consecutive years at Wake Forest, he earned first team All-American honors—a first for any NCAA athlete. He played on the 1977 Walker Cup team, captured back-to-back North & South Amateur championships and won the 1979 NCAA individual title. After turning pro, he played his way onto the TOUR and was named rookie of the year after posting six top-10 finishes. To this day, the renowned short-game guru Dave Pelz maintains Hallberg possesses the most natural short-game talent he’s seen or taught.

Those skills would bring Hallberg three wins on the PGA TOUR, but injuries affected his physical play and his mind-set. Despite the occasional flash of brilliance, he faded from the professional golf scene during his 40s. He and his family remained in Colorado, where they have resided for some 25 years, and Gary worked through a number of golf-related ventures.

Of course, old golfers never die. They look forward to a new career at 50 on the Champions Tour, and by the time Hallberg hit the half-century in 2008, he was rarin’ to go.

“I might have been at a little bit of a disadvantage because I didn’t play straight through my 40s,” he says now. “With the advances in equipment and physical fitness, guys can stay competitive a lot longer. So I had a little catch-up to do.”

Hallberg reacquainted himself with McGetrick to work on his game and became a member at the new Colorado Golf Club, which provided him with a championship venue – the club hosted the 2010 Senior PGA Championship – and drove himself back into shape after a disappointing 2009 season.

“Nobody works harder than Gary Hallberg,” says Graham Cliff, head professional at Colorado Golf Club. “There were days that winter leading up to the Senior PGA when it would be 25 degrees and completely snowed in, and Gary would be out there practicing off of a mat with a video camera set up. He’d call me over and ask me to watch him hit a few balls – like, a dozen nine-irons that landed within five feet of each other. ‘Well, he would say,’ see anything?’ Yeah, I saw something – the reason Gary Hallberg plays golf for a living.”

A Senior PGA Championship victory at his home club would have meant the world to Hallberg, and he admitted to dreaming about it. Four holes into the championship, however, Hallberg stood at four-over-par. Then he caught fire for the home crowd, played the remainder of the round five-under for a 71 and went on to tie for 36th.

In many ways it was a microcosm of Hallberg’s Champions Tour career. His internal debate raged on, until finally McGetrick approached him and volunteered his services as caddie for the final six events of the season.

“Our goal was to go out and win a tournament and get into the top 30,” Hallberg says. “And I have to say, Mike really helped me crystallize my belief that I could get it done. We got the win and might have made the top 30, but we just ran out of tournaments.”

The 2011 season begins with a limited-field event, the Mitsubishi Electric Championship at Hualalai. Gary Hallberg is there at this writing, preparing and knowing that his spot in this and in every other field on the 2011 Champions Tour schedule is secure.

“All this time, I’ve enjoyed such great support. My wife. My son (Eric, a standout junior player in his own right). They’ve always told me that playing golf is what I’m supposed to do, that it’s who I am. I mean, how fortunate am I? Because of that, I’m free to approach this season with some high goals.”

Those goals include tournament wins, a top-10 finish on the money list and a desire to become one of the consistent top players on the Champions Tour.

“I believe I’ve got the tools,” Hallberg says, his voice rising like a young man’s as the future begins to come into clearer view.

When that next victory comes, look for it on the sports pages. The greeting card moment was nice, but Hallberg is eager to push the envelope a lot farther.

Tom Ferrell is Colorado AvidGolfer’s editor at large.

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