Neal eager to compete in inaugural Chicago Adaptive Open
Marty Neal, the Libertyville Township Highway Commissioner, has long been an avid golfer. Now 61, he’s been playing for 40 years — and that’s since he lost his right hand after it got caught in a meat grinder when he was 15.
On May 10 he made his first hole-in-one when his tee shot on the 11th hole at Shepherd’s Crook, in Zion, fell into the cup. That was a thrill, but not nearly as exciting as Neal felt after learning about the inaugural Chicago Adaptive Open.
Created by the Chicago District Golf Association with guidance from Jonathan Snyder, head of the Chicago-based United States Adaptive Golf Alliance, the event will bring together the world’s best golfers with physical and intellectual disabilities on Cog Hill’s No. 3 course in Lemont this weekend.
There will be 53 competitors, 49 of them men and 20 in the senior category. They’ll have a practice round on Friday and tournament rounds Saturday and Sunday. The tournament rounds will start at 10:10 a.m. both days.
Adaptive golf is growing, and the Chicago event on one of the city’s premier courses, is further evidence of that.
The Cog Hill complex has 72 holes and its No. 4 course, Dubsdread, was the longtime site of the Western Open and hosted a variety of competitions, including the U.S. Amateur and BMW Championship. Now the facility will host one of the first adaptive tournaments on Dubsdread’s companion course.
Neal, son of the late Libertyville Mayor Paul Neal, has a handicap index of 16 — not too shabby for a senior player who swings a club with just his left arm. He plays in a weekly league and frequents suburban courses like Countryside and Pine Meadow, in Mundelein; White Deer Run, in Vernon Hills; and Lake Bluff.
The Chicago Adaptive Open will be an entirely different golf experience, however. Neal promptly paid the $200 entry fee, went through an elaborate registration process with the European Handicapped Golf Association, lined up two sons and his older brother to be his caddies and then took the adventure even further.
“I’m just a regular guy, an average golfer who — on a good day — can shoot in the high 80s or low 90s,’’ Neal said. ”It’ll be so cool to meet someone who is good at golf who has a disability like mine, but I’m also a research participant at the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab (formerly the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago).’’
He also serves as a model for students learning to build prosthetics in a Masters program at Northwestern University. He wanted to connect the CDGA, the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab and Northwestern, figuring that all three parties would want to have a presence in the Chicago Adaptive Open. He’ll wear Shirley Ryan apparel in the competition.
The competition will be serious stuff, too. The event features a $15,000 purse, which Snyder says marks the first time prize money will be part of an adaptive golf competition. The first three finishers in each of 17 sports classifications will get cash prizes. Adaptive events are on the rise since the U.S. Golf Association created a national championship a couple years ago. Some states, notably Georgia and Indiana, also have their own competitions.
Competitive categories are based on impairment, such as lower limb, arm and visual. Adaptive golf already has its celebrity competitors who are expected at Cog Hill. Dennis Walters is a World Golf Hall of Famer who has his own television show. Paralyzed from the waist down he’ll compete in the seated golfers category.
Ryanne Jackson, from Florida, was the overall women’s champion at the 2023 U.S. Adaptive Open, staged at Pinehurst, the North Carolina base for the recent U.S. Open. Diagnosed with muscular dystrophy at the age of 19, she competed collegiately at Eastern Illinois.
Evan Mathias, born with congenital defects to both legs, has been on prosthetics since he was 1 year old. He won the Indiana Adaptive Championship in May, shooting 5-under-par golf over 36 holes and then taking the title in a four-hole playoff.
Here and there:
The Evanston Wilmette Golf Course Association and Kemper Sports have announced the rebranding of Canal Shores, a 100-year-old par-60 course that is being upgraded in preparation for a reopening in 2025. The course will be renamed The Evans at Canal Shores, underscoring its connection to the Western Golf Association’s Evans Scholars Foundation.
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Parker Sands, of Edmond, Oklahoma, captured the 106th playing of the Western Junior at Ruth Lake, in Hinsdale. Sand won by 6 strokes after posting a 72-hole score of 10-under-par 270.