Becoming a Pro

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With all the talk about goals, let’s not forget the most important factor: how does one become a pro? Assuming your game is tight as a drum, then how do you become a golf pro? It depends on your definition of what a “pro” is. There are many different paths that can be taken in golf. The PGA of America defines several career paths. They range from course/pro shop management, teaching, and everything in between. Then of course there’s the touring pros. Let’s look at those three, because they’re the ones that align with my own goals, and we’ll see what it takes to get a foot in the door.

Club Pro

These guys and gals run the clubs. They help to make our golf lives fun. They manage the club, give instruction, organize outings and all the other stuff associated with keeping a course running. The PGA of America has a good deal of information about becoming a PGA professional.

One of the first steps to becoming a PGA professional is taking the Playing Ability Test. This is a playing test that ensures that you have the minimum amount of required golf ability and aptitude. It’s a 36-hole test where the target score is double the course rating, plus 15. So, if the course rating is 70, then your 36-hole target score is 70 * 2 + 15 = 155, or about 77 on each round (for a course rating of 70). Obviously, this will vary across different courses.

So, now that the PAT is out of the way, then what? The next step is a registered apprenticeship and the PGA Professional Golf Management(PGM) program. This is a 4 1/2 year program that teaches the skills required to be a PGA professional. There are many golf programs offered in colleges and specialized academies that offer the PGM program as a curriculum, so it’s possible to satisfy that requirement while at college, as opposed to while on the job as an apprentice. Once you become an apprentice, you have 8 years in which to pass a series of checkpoints, graduate from the PGM program and be elected to membership.

Teaching Pro

There’s not much of a difference between a club pro (or a head/assistant golf professional, in PGA terminology). Mainly, it’s an issue of which way you steer your career. The requirements to achieve that status are primarily the same. Your avenues of opportunity kind of open up a bit thought because many times, instruction occurs at golf schools, retail outlets, and other places away from the traditional golf club.

Touring Pro

That leaves my favorite. These are the people who make careers out of tournament play. To me, this is the top rung on the ladder that is my quest. To many people, when they hear “tour pro”, it means the men and women they see on TV every weekend. While they are certainly tour pros, the PGA Tour isn’t the only outlet for tournament golf.  There are literally dozens of professional golf tours across the U.S. and world. You’ve probably never heard of most of them, but they’re out there.

There are usually two ways to join most of the tours. Many, especially the smaller ones, allow you to simply buy your way in. If I get my foot in the door as a teaching pro or club pro, and feel like I have enough game to pursue tournament play, then these small, regional tours will be a good way to test the waters. The schedules are shorter, the events are spaced a little further apart, and it would allow me to keep my primary job (assuming my employer is ok with me taking time off to play competitively).

The other method of getting on tour is to play your way in. This is more prevalent on the larger tours like the PGA Tour or the Nationwide Tour. We’ve all heard of the dreaded Q-School, where players either get a chance to realize their dreams or have them crushed. The top 30 finishers at Q-School get PGA Tour cards, and next 50 players qualify to play on the Nationwide Tour.

North of the border and kind of along the lines of the Nationwide Tour, there’s the Canadian Tour which has produced several PGA Tour stars like Mike Weir and Chris DiMarco, among others. The Canadian Tour also employs a Q-School qualifying tournament for membership.

After that there are literally dozens of regional tours like the Gateway Tour, the NGA Hooters Tour, The Adams Golf Pro Tour Series, and the U.S. Pro Golf Tour.

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So that pretty much covers it. These three paths are the ones that I’m targeting as my goal. Right now, all the things I’m doing to achieve my goal align well with all three of these paths. Once I get further along, I’ll need to refine my strategy to help me move in the direction I want to go. But that’s a ways off. I still have a lot of work to do. See you at the range.