Riley Furey tries a chip shot to the first hole at The Willows.
By Craig Westcott
He didn’t even start golfing until Covid closed the planet, but already Avondale’s Riley Furey is becoming a golf professional.
Last week, the 24-year-old, who hones his game at the picturesque Willows golf club in Holyrood, passed the first major hurdle towards gaining his status as a Class A Pro.
Becoming skilled in the game so quickly is not so surprising given Furey was an ace pitcher and second basemen with Newfoundland’s fastpitch softball team, but to achieve his level of skill in golf so quickly, is remarkable. He has already matched the course record at The Willows, which is 33 on the 9-hole course, finishing with an eagle on the challenging par 4 nine, which has two rivers bisecting the fairway between the tee and the green. In plainer English, he managed to put the ball in the hole from 410 yards away in just two shots. A very good golfer, on a good day, is lucky to do it in four shots.
“I didn’t even get to see it go in,” said Furey said. “I saw it go towards the flag over the bunker and then I heard the guys on the fourth green screaming, so I went up and there it was, in the hole.”
Furey had stopped playing sports when he entered university.
“But then when Covid hit, I was home and had nothing else to do,” Furey said. “My dad (Jeff Whelan) was always golfing and when Covid started they made it so that you could only golf with members of your household, when they did the social distancing. So, my dad had nobody to golf with and he asked me one day. And for some reason I had always put golf to the side, I didn’t really have much interest in it, but then I went out with him to the driving range and after the first good ball I hit I wanted to keep coming back and getting better.”
Furey, who is in the last year of a business degree at MUN, also works at The Willows, where he hones his skills after hours when the other golfers have gone for the day. He put his studies on temporary hold this summer when he decided to go for his pro card.
“I figured if I can break 40 at the (par 35) Willows, which I know is a pretty tight, hard course, I can probably go shoot an 80 at the courses up away,” Furey said. “So once I had that in my mind I started really putting in a lot of work, especially with my short game. After work, once everyone was off the course, I’d go out for a couple of hours until dark on the first green chipping and stuff. And I think that’s where I shaved the most strokes off my game.”
Furey, who is tall and, as the old fellows would say, as thin as a night’s frost, can carry the ball about 270 yards before it hits the ground and bounces even further. “That’s if I’m swinging it hard,” he said. “But I don’t really swing too hard, to be honest. I kind of focus on keeping the ball straight.”
The professional program he has entered is administered by the CPGA, the Canadian Pro Golf Association. The goal is to become a Class A Professional. To qualify for to try out, you have to be at least 18, have worked 400 hours in the golf industry, have a reference from a qualified golf professional, and a reference from a golf course.
“The next step after that is to do the thing I just did in Halifax, which is go do the playability test,” Furey said. “For that you’ve got to shoot an 80 or better from the second furthest back tees.”
Furey shot a 77.
“I had a practice round and on the practice round I shot a 77 as well,” he said. “I got out with three members, and I was asking them a million questions. I felt annoying, but it was for a good cause, because I was trying to figure out everything I could about the course. I was very nervous. My (older) brother Coady went with me. He goes everywhere with me. I’m after playing 70 rounds, just with my brother this year. And he was even nervous. He dropped me off to the course two hours before my tee time, just so I could warm up and get the nerves away. And I thought that would fix it, but I was nervous the whole six-hour round.”
By passing the playability test, Furey is now considered an apprentice professional.
“So, I can be an assistant pro at golf courses, I can play in pro tournaments, I can give lessons, I just can’t be a head pro (at a club) yet,” Furey said.
To qualify as a head pro, Furey will have to complete 35 online credit courses on everything from the rules of golf to how to instruct beginners. And he will have to compile 3,000 hours working in the golf industry.
“It’s kind of hard to get 3,000 hours in the golf industry here (in Newfoundland) where we have such a short season,” he allowed. “So, I guess that will take me a little bit of time.”
There are only two other CPGA registered golf pros on the Avalon that Furey is aware of, one at Bally Haly golf course, and one at The Willows’ sister course, the 18-hole Glendenning.
Furey is not thinking just yet about trying to make the professional tour, where the big money from tournaments and sponsorships lies. He would probably have to move to the United States for that and, like many other pros starting out, work his way up through a series of regional qualifying tournaments to hopefully, eventually, make it to the big league.
“I’m kind of more focused on giving back to the game a little,” he said. “I’m really interested in teaching the youth. That’s kind of what got me wanting to get my pro card. I’ve been helping a few members at The Willows lately with a few things, but technically I couldn’t give them lessons. But now I can. So that’s kind of what I’m more interested in now is just teaching and showing people the fundamentals and getting more people into the game.”
Furey said his business studies have helped him along the path towards the pro status.
In October, he will head to Ottawa for a three day clinic on a private course for one of the CPGA courses on instructing beginners. “That pretty much gives you the layout of how to plan out your teachings and the things you should focus on first,” he said.
In the meantime, Furey counts himself lucky to be able to work at one of the most beautiful places in the world.
“I wouldn’t want to work anywhere else,” he said. “If it wasn’t for (operations manager) Andy Borill and all the stuff he’s done for me through The Willows, I definitely wouldn’t have my pro card right now, that’s for sure…It doesn’t even feel like a job, to be honest. Most days when I go in it just feels like I’m going to my happy place, really. There’s no place I’d rather be than at The Willows. There’s something about that course that’s so peaceful.”
Furey is grateful for the support of other staff there as well, including his co-worker in the pro shop, Kayla Warford, who had a big congratulatory card signed by the club’s members waiting for him on the counter when he got back from Halifax. And he is mindful of the support of his family, including his dad Jeff who got him into the game, his mom Jillian Furey and his grandparents Agnes and Harold Furey.
“I’d definitely like to thank my brother,” Furey added, “because without him, I definitely wouldn’t be where I am with golf. I’d be golfing alone everyday, and that wouldn’t help me at all.”
