The Scottish Disability Golf & Curling Charity (SDGC) holds over 100 events for its members per year, providing a platform for disabled golfers and curlers to play on the international stage.
Having first picked up a set of clubs in 1995, Jim Gales MBE was sitting in a pub with friends, in 2002 when he had the initial idea for what would become the SDGC. Registered blind, Jim was playing in a few disabled golf competitions and was keen on implementing many of the ideas that helped see the game thrive in Canada replicated back home in Scotland.
Twenty years on from putting in an application to the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust, the SDGC has over 1,100 members and has held close to 1,000 golf and curling events in seven countries.
“The Canadians were set up for this kind of thing well before us, ”Jim told Fen Regis Trophies of his experience of playing disabled golf in Canada. “We played in Toronto, Winnipeg and Saskatchewan and had a couple of meetings there.”
Golf and Curling
The SDGC was established in its current guise in 2018, bringing together the original golf group and Disabled Curlers Scotland (formed in 2014). The idea to combine the two organisations came about as they were seeing the same names enter events in both sports.
“It works well, as once one season has ended the other is just beginning, allowing for a seamless transition from golf to curling and vice versa.
“We’ve always curled during the winter and golfed during the summer as a general rule. We’re talking Scottish weather here, come on,” Jim exclaimed.
“It’s a similar thing in Canada and that’s why we stole their formats. We’ve had a lot of guys come over here and take our new framework, from the likes of New Zealand, Norway, the States, England, Wales, and more.
“We have curled since the mid-90s, and became a golf charity in 2009 and subsequently curling in 2014.
“It all came together in 2018 when the SDGC was formed. That’s been a lot easier, funding-wise, rather than being two separate entities.”
As well as holding events and competitions for their members, the SDGC also organises lessons and practice time for newer members at their hubs, with coaches and PGA professionals. The organisation offers these sessions for free and has provided some 4,200 lessons to date, offering a pathway to players from absolute beginners to those who compete around the world.
Jim said: “There’s loads of opportunity and a pathway from absolute beginner to national, regional, and international competition.
“It’s up to the individual to take what they want from what’s on offer. Some guys we see only once or twice a year, then we have the stalwarts who turn out week after week.”
While a lot of hard work goes into organising the hubs for the members of the SDGC, Jim has found no hardship in finding willing coaches and professionals to deliver tailored sessions.
“In all the time we’ve done it, we have never come across a coach or pro that has refused or felt unable to teach anybody with a disability.
“There are always one or two guys that have never dealt with disabled players before and ask a load of questions. There’s nothing wrong with that at all.
“We just tell them to take things as they come and don’t worry about it, just get out there and enjoy. In the time that we have done it, we have used more than 125 different professionals.
“Like any kind of tuition, some are better than others, but I think that’s more due to an individual’s perception rather than any rigid format. There are plenty of pros and plenty of individual ideas.”
Inclusivity
Inclusivity is the SDGC’s number one priority, providing a platform for members to play golf and curling regardless of their disability. Unlike many bodies, the SDGC does not categorise players by disability, using a golf handicap system, that places everyone on a level playing field so that they can compete against one another.
Following a series of meetings stemming from the initial idea, Jim founded the Scottish Disability Golf Partnership (SDGP) in 2004. He said: “I was involved with some groups for blind golf; the Society of One-Armed Golfers, and the Scottish Deaf Golf Association – all three of those now are very, very small.
“Basically, there was nobody dealing with all disabilities and you had to fit into a certain category or criteria and they were excluding a lot more people than they were actually accepting.
“We went along to the local voluntary organisation and said that we want to form this group to include all types of disabilities. They said alright and drafted a basic constitution so that we were fully inclusive.
“We started off with about 30 people and it’s gone on from there.”
He added: “If you’ve got a disability or a serious health problem, you can come and join us. There’s a lot of health conditions that we’ve never come across before.
“They might have a health problem like severe arthritis, or something like that, and that doesn’t qualify as a disability as such even though it is debilitating; it will obviously interfere with your golf and your golf swing.”
Disability Golf v Traditional Golf
While there are obvious accommodations that have to be made for disabled golfers, Jim, who participates in many of the events himself, says that there is not a lot of difference between disability golf and the mainstream game.
“I have a guide whose job it is to paint me a mental picture of the course or shot. If it’s a course that I’ve never played before, it is their job to describe it and say ‘well, I wouldn’t use a driver on this particular hole, maybe drop to a five-wood because of the bunker?’
“On the putting green, they would pace out the distance from the ball to the pin and say ‘10 yards’ line up the putter head and leave me to judge the strength of shot.”
Of the numerous events the SDGC holds every year, there are two that catch the eye. The British Open and Phoenix Cup are the two most prestigious events on the calendar and Jim is looking forward to them both.
“The British Open that we stage every year started as the Scottish Open, but we merged with another charity down in England and we now do it as the British.
“It’s open to anyone with amateur status. This year, it’s going to be three days, 54 holes, with a hub attached to it for anyone else that wants to come along.
“The other one, that gets equal billing, which is our Ryder or Solheim, is the Phoenix Cup.”
The 28th Phoenix Cup will be contested between four nations, Scotland, England, Wales, and the United States between the 13th and 16th of August. This will see players compete in Birmingham at the Forest of Arden Marriott Hotel & Country Club before next year’s tournament is played in Los Angeles, California.
This year’s British Open will be the 10th holding of the competition and will take place at Strathmore Golf Centre in Alyth between 13th and 15th September. Jim will be hoping to retain his golf trophy, having been crowned the overall net champion in 2021!
Improved Standard
When asked about what his proudest achievement has been with the SDGC, Jim believes it is the status of the body and what it has helped to do for the standard of disability golf and curling. Currently, much of the admin is handled by him and his wife, Janet, and believes that, at some point, the charity will have to employ someone to lend a hand.
“The overall status of the SDGC, compared to what it was, [is my proudest achievement],” he admitted. “We’re leading the way with people coming to visit us and taking our ideas and taking them back to their own country.”
“There’s not a specific thing that I can say is the best thing ever. We probably do more than a hundred events each year; over this last curling season, we’ve done 50 games.”
Jim added: “Without a doubt [the standard has improved]. We started with a handful of events before we became an official organisation.
“There were a few guys that were members of golf clubs, the rest of us were playing to the handicap system that we generated ourselves, based on the CONGU system at that time.
“The standard was average (in the beginning), I suppose you could say at that time, now we’ve got guys that play not only in our competitions but travel all around the world and compete successfully.”
