Updated Wednesday, October 1, 2008
HALL OF FAMER FIORELLA DIES: Katie Fiorella, who was inducted into the Colorado Golf Hall of Fame in 1989, passed away this week at age 80. Fiorella was long one of the top female amateurs in the Denver area, winning the Denver Women’s Golf Invitational twice and the Colorado Women’s Golf Association Senior Stroke Play three times.
A funeral service for Fiorella will be held Friday (Oct. 3) at 1 p.m. at St. Mary Magdalene Catholic Church in Denver (2771 Zenobia St.). A reception will follow at the Wheat Ridge Recreation Center (4005 Kipling St.).
McGILL POSTS ANOTHER TOP 10 ON LPGA TOUR: Denver native and Cherry Creek High School graduate Jill McGill finished sixth in the Navistar LPGA Classic on Sunday. The performance was her second-best on the LPGA Tour since May 2005. She finished third at the MasterCard Classic in March. Sunday’s showing moved McGill up to 61st on the LPGA’s 2008 money list, at $190,816.
WIEBE SURPASSES $1 MILLION FOR 2008: Aurora’s Mark Wiebe, in finishing 17th Sunday in the Champions Tour’s SAS Championship, passed the $1 million mark for a year for the first time in his PGA/Champions Tour career. In fact, his previous best is the $511,414 he won on the PGA Tour in 2000.
2 COLORADANS SUCCESSFULLY NEGOTIATE PGA TOUR PRE-QUALIFYING: Tom Glissmeyer of Colorado Springs and Michael Baird of Castle Rock advanced through the PGA Tour pre-qualifying tournament recently and earned spots in the first stage of the three-stage qualifying process. Glissmeyer just began his senior season at the University of Southern California, while Baird completed his senior season at the University of Colorado in May. The first stage of Tour qualifying will be held Oct. 21-24 and Oct. 29-Nov. 1.
CLUBS WITH BEST PLAYERS: In the most recent Golf Digest Index, the magazine put forth a list of the 50 golf clubs in America with the best players. The list was compiled by requesting the handicap indexes of the 10 best amateur players at each club as of July 2008. Two Colorado clubs made the list: Cherry Hills Country Club south of Denver (plus-1.14 average handicap for the top 10, good for 40th place) and the Country Club of Colorado in Colorado Springs (plus-1.03, 48th place). Glissmeyer (see above) leads the way at the CC of Colorado with a plus-5.6 handicap.
GARY BAINES: Taking Notes
Loeffler Set to Defend National Title
Denver native has enjoyed considerable success in big events
Bill Loeffler, no stranger to being in contention at important national and international golf tournaments, took a calculated risk last year at the Senior PGA Professional National Championship.
The Denver native held a one-shot lead going into the final hole of the event in Port St. Lucie, Fla. With heavy rain having plagued the tournament, there was standing water in the bunkers, and Loeffler tried to avoid going into the sand by hitting a 3-wood off the tee on the par-4. But he pushed his tee shot into a fairway bunker, leaving his ball in a quarter of an inch of water.
Faced with a 158-yard approach shot with nothing but water between himself and the green, Loeffler elected not to take a free drop, knowing his ball would plug in the sand. Instead, he hit his approach with a 6-iron from its watery, sandy lie, flushing an odds-defying shot within 12 feet of the pin. From there, Loeffler two-putted for a par and victory.
“I figured I either hit it into the water or onto the green,” Loeffler
Monday, September 29, 2008
GOLF NOTES
remembers thinking about his approach. “It was probably the best shot I’ve hit in 12 years.”
The resulting win was a big one for Loeffler, but one of several of similar caliber for the Cherry Creek High School graduate, who will defend his Senior PGA Professional National Championship title Thursday through Sunday in La Quinta, Calif.
Indeed, the 52-year-old Castle Rock resident is one of the most successful golfers Colorado has ever produced. He won the U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship in 1986, the PGA Assistant Professional Championship in 1992 and the national senior title last year. In addition, he’s claimed the Colorado Open title three times. The former PGA Tour player also competed on a U.S. Walker Cup team that won in England in 1987.
In short, it’s been a great career for Loeffler, now co-owner and operator of Highlands Ranch Golf Club.
Asked Sunday which of his accomplishments he’s most proud of, Loeffler said without hesitation that it was the Walker Cup, which pits the best amateurs in the U.S. against Great Britain and Ireland. When Loeffler was on the team with the likes of Billy Andrade, Billy Mayfair, Len Mattiace and Jay Sigel, the Americans defeated a Colin Montgomerie-led GBI team 16½-7½.
“That was the best,“ Loeffler said. “It’s about a tenth of what the Ryder Cup is, but it’s great. We were playing over there (in England) as the underdog. I hit the first shot of foursomes the first day. I couldn’t breathe or speak. There were all these Englishmen, these great fans, lining the holes. It was awesome. That was the best thing that’s ever happened to me in golf.
“The Colorado Open is nice; it’s our ‘major.’ It was spectacular when we played at Hiwan. It even used to be on TV. The U.S. Mid-Am (win) got me into the Walker Cup and the Masters. You can’t get much better than that. Then last year (in the national senior event), it’s great beating a lot of the best (senior) players in the nation.”
This week in La Quinta, Loeffler will once again compete in a 264-man field in the Senior PGA Professional National Championship. Besides the title, up for grabs will be an exemption into the Champions Tour qualifying final stage for the top five finishers, and a spot into the 2009 Senior PGA Championship for the top 35 finishers.
Loeffler was mainly focused on those exemptions when he went into last year’s tournament. But things changed when he found a groove and was in contention.
“First you have to make the cut down to 70,” Loeffler said. “When I did that, I found something in my swing. I was hitting everything at the hole. I was kind of in shock. There was so much rain that we never re-paired. They said to just keep going. So I got into a rhythm. It was very interesting. I was very surprised I won. It never even crossed my mind until the last nine holes.”
As for this year, Loeffler admits to being a bit “stale” by virtue of a lot of tournament golf recently. “That seems to have taken a bit of a toll,” he said.
Nevertheless, Loeffler added, “If I play like I have the past couple of weeks, I’ve got a good chance at playing well again (at the national tournament). Of course, when you start thinking you’re the greatest thing since slice bread, you sometimes end up with mud on your face. It would be great to win, but there are (264) players, and they‘re all pretty darned good.”
Later in the fall, for the third straight year, Loeffler is also planning to take a crack at qualifying for the Champions Tour. He was going to skip it, but his wife, Sandy, convinced him otherwise.
“She told me to go this one last time,” Loeffler said. “She said if I don’t, 10 years from now I’m going to regret it. And she’s right. She’s always right.”
Bill Loeffler
