No Tiger, but Foley’s stable is full Golf Tips

No Tiger, but Foley’s stable is full

June 18, 2011, 6:10 am

BETHESDA, MD. – With the late-afternoon sun beating down, only a few stragglers remained on the range Wednesday at Congressional County Club.

On the far side of the tee, a player went about his work under the steady eye of his coach.

“Is that Sean Foley?” one of the remaining spectators said as a small crowd formed.

Indeed it was the now-famous Canadian golf instructor.

“Who is the guy he’s watching?” another spectator asked, the name boards on the tee boxes having been put away for the evening. “Jason Day?”

“I can tell it’s a pro by the way he’s hitting it,” another spectator guessed, correctly.

The player in question was Oshawa’s Jon Mills, standing in the shadow of his teacher.

The question these fans might have asked was: “Sean Foley has students other than Tiger Woods?”

But such is life now for Foley, who helped Woods with his swing at the PGA Championship last season and soon thereafter became his coach. The affable 36-year-old says the extra attention doesn’t get to him.

“There are obviously a lot more demands from the media but I don’t necessarily have to call people back or e-mail,” Foley said. “When you get stopped on the course by people, they just want to talk and say hello, so it’s cool.”

By his position alone, Foley has become a bit of a reluctant celebrity.

“I couldn’t care less about celebrity because, basically, your reputation is built by others. I’m still Sean Foley from Burlington, Ontario. And I’ve always stopped to helped homeless people or anything like that, so if someone wants to stop and say hello, that’s fine.”

Some might consider it to be a good thing for Foley that Woods isn’t playing in this U.S. Open, giving the teacher a chance to spend some time with his other clients. But Foley doesn’t see it that way.

“No, I don’t think there’s any good byproduct of not having Tiger here,” he said. “That being said, I’ll just be out (watching players) from 7 (a.m.) until 7 (p.m.). It just means if there are more guys, there’s more time I spend (not that Woods consumes more of his time than others).”

His stable of clients playing this week includes Nationwide Tour player Mills, along with PGA Tour stars Hunter Mahan and Justin Rose.

“They look really good, actually,” Foley said of Mahan and Rose. “Who knows what happens during the tournament, but right now they’re both very well prepared and they’ve been both playing really well this year.

“There haven’t been the wins … but I think Justin is top-25 in 90% of his starts and Hunter has seven top-10s in his last 12 events, so that’s the kind of form you want to bring into something like this and the British (Open) and PGA (Championship).”

Foley said Rose’s great 2010 season — winning the Memorial and the AT&T National — boosted his confidence.

“Justin got to a point years ago where he was sixth in the world, but he did it predominantly with short game,” Foley said. “Last year he won twice on the PGA Tour and really had a banner year, but it just came from kind of understanding more about his golf game and working on stuff like evolving as a human being.”

Apart from his own guys, Foley said a couple of players stand out for him as contenders for the U.S. Open, which starts Thursday.

“You have to like Lee Westwood, for sure. I think you have to look at Matt Kuchar. I’d say those two.”

Foley also is encouraged with Mills’ game.

“We had an opportunity this week to get together and spend a couple of hours. I don’t know if what we’ve done will be grooved by (Thursday), obviously, but I wanted to give him something to continue to play well this year (on the Nationwide Tour) and get back out to the PGA Tour.”

And maybe become as recognizable as his coach.

tim.mckay@sunmedia.ca

Golf Tips