Whiteford forced to dig deep to find rich vein of form

Golf Correspondent

Thursday 9 June 2011

Having a younger brother who is growing in stature on the professional stage is perhaps not good for productivity in the workplace.

Custom byline text:

NICK RODGER

Just ask Stewart Whiteford, the PGA professional at the bustling, family-run Wellsgreen facility in Fife and the elder sibling of the increasingly impressive European Tour campaigner Peter. “I don’t think there’s been a round of golf Peter’s played in the past few years that I’ve not known his score within a couple of holes because of live scoring,” he confessed. “I spend most of the time looking at the computer screen when he’s playing.”

And why not? There’s been plenty to grab the attention, particularly in recent weeks. A seventh-place finish in the BMW PGA championship at Wentworth 11 days ago secured the younger Whiteford a career-best cheque for over £87,000 and provided the catalyst for a purposeful spell that was followed up by an eighth place in last weekend’s Wales Open and qualification for next month’s Open championship in the 36-hole scramble at Sunningdale on Monday.As a nation, we like nothing better than a good whinge about the state of Scottish golf but even those seasoned observers of the game who are mired in fusty grumbliness would have had their sombre mood lifted by Whiteford’s progress. At 49th on the Race to Dubai rankings and officially the fifth best Scot in the world at No.226, the 30-year-old, who was runner-up in the Andalucian Open last year, is blossoming in the international arena. His rise through the ranks has been one characterised by a dogged determination to succeed in a sport that can easily grind down the spirit.A winner on the third-tier EuroPro Tour circuit in 2002 and 2003, Whiteford spent the next few years grafting away on the Challenge Tour but, as resources began to dwindle, the reality of life at the grim coalface of professional golf hit home in 2007. It was an episode both Whiteford brothers recall vividly.“There was a time when I almost advised him to pack it in, which would’ve been a bad thing in hindsight,” said 32-year-old Stewart, who won the Scottish Boys’ title in 1996, the same year as Peter landed the national under-16 strokeplay crown. “He was on the Challenge Tour for a couple of years and he wasn’t really going anywhere and he was getting a bit down. I remember he phoned me from Kazakhstan and he was wanting to come home and pack it in. The only reason he didn’t come back was that he couldn’t get a flight home. He’d booked a flight to his next event in the Netherlands so he went there and won it. Then he won again two weeks later. All that came out of wanting to finish with the game.”Peter himself added: “It got to a point where I was wondering how long I could keep going. The Challenge Tour is expensive to play on week-in, week out. When you’re making a loss each year, you just can’t keep going, especially when my family were shelling out the cash. I was hunting for jobs at one stage. I didn’t have many qualifications and, like a lot of golfers, you wonder what you’d do if it all goes downhill. There was a lot of pressure but, thankfully, those days are past just now.”That double triumph towards the end of the 2007 season -- he won the Dutch Futures event and the PGA European Challenge in Germany in the space of a fortnight -- helped to galvanise Whiteford’s career and earned him promotion to the main European Tour for the first time. Despite an eighth- place finish in the Volvo China Open during his rookie campaign of 2008, the Fifer failed to retain his playing rights but he bounced back swiftly the following year and won the Challenge Tour’s Grand Final in southern Italy to secure an instant return to the top table. He has not looked back since.“It’s been a long journey,” he said. “I’ve done it the hard way through all the levels. Obviously, there have been hard times but you benefit from all of that in the long run. You need to dig deep at times and those experiences have certainly helped me.”Whiteford will now look to continue his rich vein of form in today’s Italian Open in Turin. Back at Wellsgreen, Stewart will no doubt have the live-scoring up and running again as he keeps an eye on his brother’s quest for a maiden tour title that he believes can be achieved.“Peter’s always had the ability,” concluded Stewart. “He’s won at every level. He won as an amateur, he won on the EuroPro Tour and he won on the Challenge Tour. There’s no reason why he can’t do it on the European Tour. When he gets in a good position he doesn’t back off. He doesn’t play for a good finish, he plays to win. I wouldn’t put it past him to do it one of these days.”

Commenting & Moderation

We moderate all comments on HeraldScotland on either a pre-moderated or post-moderated basis. If you're a relatively new user then your comments will be reviewed before publication and if we know you well then your comments will be subject to moderation only if other users or the moderators believe you've broken the rules, which are available here.

Moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours. Please be patient if your posts are not approved instantly.

Whiteford forced to dig deep to find rich vein of form

Commenting & Moderation

MOST READ

SPONSORED LINKS

MOST COMMENTED