What would the inaugural AJGA Hale Irwin Colorado Junior tournament be without Hale Irwin himself?
Irwin, the three-time U.S. Open champion who spent many of his formative years in Boulder, will provide one of the highlights of tournament week as CommonGround Golf Course in Aurora hosts the AJGA event June 1-4.
Two days before his 70th birthday, the former two-sport athlete from the University of Colorado plans to conduct a short-game clinic and do a Q&A with CGA executive director Ed Mate at CommonGround, which is owned and operated by the CGA and CWGA. Irwin’s son, Steve, serves on the volunteer board of governors for the CGA and has won five CGA championships, including the 2004 Match Play.
The by-invitation-only Hale Irwin event is scheduled for June 1, the day before championship play begins in the 54-hole tournament. The tourney is expected to draw a strong national/international field, along with some of the best players from Colorado — both boys and girls, who will compete in separate divisions.
Having Hale Irwin — the most successful golfer to have grown up in Colorado — on hand for the AJGA tournament will put a nice exclamation mark on the week.
“It’s exactly what we were hoping for,” Mate said. “With his connections to Colorado, this is a great way to honor his legacy in the state. That’s special, especially with this being (the CGA’s) centennial year.”
Appropriately, the Hale Irwin tournament — the first AJGA event held in Colorado since 2013 — is being conducted at CommonGround, which is the home of the Hale Irwin Elite Player Program. The program, which was launched in 2012, is designed to nurture the budding talents of promising junior players in the state.
Irwin is an ideal role model for such players given his background and what he’s accomplished.
In 1962, he captured his first state championship, prevailing in the CGA Junior Match Play. He then won the individual state high school title in 1963, helping his Boulder High squad claim the team championship.
That same year, having just turned 18, Irwin won the first of three consecutive CGA Stroke Play titles, becoming the first person to accomplish that feat. (He’s pictured above on the 50th anniversary of the first of those victories.) In 1966 in his hometown of Boulder, Irwin captured the CGA Match Play championship, in the finals defeating three-time defending champion, current Colorado Golf Hall of Famer and CU teammate Larry McAtee, 5 and 4.
In ’66 as an amateur, Irwin also qualified for his first U.S. Open and went on to make the cut. Later that year, he was named an All-Big Eight defensive back in football for the second time. And the next spring he won the NCAA golf individual title while a CU senior.
All that happened while Irwin lived in Colorado — not the ideal climate for golf. But even with snow on the ground, Irwin practiced, showing competitiveness and resolve that few have matched.
“That just comes down to the ‘These guys aren’t going to beat me’ attitude,” Irwin said a few years ago while in Colorado. “They could certainly outplay me but they weren’t going to beat me. They might win the battle, but I was going to win the war.”
And he did to a large extent. Irwin won 20 times on the PGA Tour, including the U.S. Open in 1974, ’79 and ’90, the last making him the oldest Open champion ever, at 45. Then he’s won 45 times on the Champions Tour — the most ever on that circuit by a remarkable margin of 16. And along the way, he earned his way into the World Golf Hall of Fame.
All in all, the Colorado kid made good.
