Editor’s note: Answering The Purcell Register’s five questions this week is Mike Gowens, Head Golf Professional at Brent Bruehl Memorial Golf Course in Purcell.
Q. What is the most rewarding part of your job?
A. Seeing the golf course go from a 9 hole course that was not really busy to a very busy 18 hole course and knowing all the effort and hard work that was put in by our staff is very rewarding.
Teaching the game and seeing someone improve is one of the favorite parts of my job!
Q. What made you decide to become a golf professional?
A. When I was in college I played football and had a teammate from Florida that also played golf. He got me to start coming out after football season and play golf with him. He was much better than me and really gave me the golf bug to get better and really fell in love with the game.
My mother got sick and I ended up back in Purcell to be close to her and ended up working at a horse ranch. I would hurry out to the golf course in the evening to try to play a few holes. Frankie Rinehart convinced me to come work for him at the golf course, then started talking to me about getting into the PGA program which was something I thought I would love.
My mother told me when I was young to do something I really enjoyed as a career because I would be doing it for a long time. Well it’s been 40 years!
Q. What is your favorite memory about being the head pro at Brent Bruehl?
A. The time I spent designing and building the additional 10 holes to make us an 18 hole golf course is one of my favorite memories.
Q. How has technology changed the game? Is it for better or worse?
A. Technology has made the game easier for the average player, which is probably good for the game as a whole. The one bad thing I see about technology, is how far the golf ball goes now is making some of the older golf courses a little bit obsolete for the best players in the world. So I would say it’s good and bad.
Q. Who taught you to play and when did you know you wanted to have a career in golf?
A. When I started playing in college, there wasn’t a real teacher in the area to give me lessons, so I studied and read everything I could about golf and essentially taught myself. This is not the way I would recommend learning, I would seek out someone qualified to teach the game and take some lessons!
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