Vince Whaley, second from right, had seven birdies and shot a 5-under 67 Sunday. (Larry Vaught Photo)
He’s not exactly a Danvillian but he is a native Kentuckian with ties to my hometown of Danville, so that was more than enough to have me rooting for Vince Whaley in the Barbasol Championship at Champions at Keene Trace outside Nicholasville.
“I feel like a little bit of a Kentucky boy. I have been going there two or three times a year since we moved when I was in kindergarten,” Whaley, age 27, said.
He had a large gallery of family and friends, including his 97-year-old grandfather, Louis Whaley, who lives in Danville. He followed his grandson all 18 holes despite being in a wheelchair.
“He doesn’t get out of the house much and it had been quite a few years since he had seen me play, so it was really nice having him there,” Whaley, who now lives in Atlanta, said.
His grandfather and others following him were treated to a show. He had seven birdies and two bogeys in his 5-under round of 67 and finished the tournament 20-under par and in fifth place. It was his second top 10 finish this season and highest of his career. He’s now won close to $900,000 this year but more importantly now has 375 FedEx Cup points to rank 103rd. That should be good enough to keep his tour card and also get in the season-ending FedEx playoffs.
“This week was very important. I had been playing well but my results were not showing it. I try not to put too much pressure on myself with the 125, but it was huge to do this well. I do not know if I locked it up (staying in the top 125), but it makes life easier,” he said. “We were looking at doing seven tournaments in a row to end the year. That might get you in the playoffs but you probably would be too tired to make much of a run. This week I can take a week off.”
He was well off the pace after his first-round 70 when he said he “putted bad, drove bad, ironed bad” and still managed a 2-under par round.
“Today was pretty typical. I did not feel great over the driver but I made a couple of long putts. Of course, I missed a couple of shorter ones, too,” he said.
His strength might be his short game — “That’s a testament to how bad I hit it for so long that I got good at getting up and down,” he said.
I knew his grandfather, Chuck LeFevers, who lived on the same street I do for many, many years. I remember LeFevers, who passed away about a year ago, talking about a grandson who was a really good young golfer. Turns out that was Vince Whaley.
“He took me to a lot of tournaments. He was kind of the one that got me into the game way back when,” Whaley said. “He was really good at making golf fun. He would have games we would play while we were playing. My dad was more strict and it was not as fun with him. With Chuck you were going to have a good time no matter what. It was just a much different vibe I really liked.”
The vibe was not always fun at the Barbasol because of weather delays Friday and Saturday. Whaley said he did a full pre-round warm up eight times during the weekend and joked Sunday night he was “feeling older” after the delays and long days at the course.
“You know what you are getting into here. The last five years it’s been like this. It’s what it is. It was tough and awful but you have to deal with it,” Whaley said.
He admits he did pay attention to the leaderboard and knew he was close to the top after his birdie on 16. However, he made bogey on 17 for the fourth straight round to end his chances of winning.
However, he will keep grinding and chasing that elusive first win. He moved to McKinney, Texas, after living in Florida a few years following the move from Lexington. He played the Texas golf circuit with current PGA Tour stars Scottie Scheffler and Jordan Spieth.
“My whole life I knew I was pretty good,” Whaley said. “I grew up playing with really good players who ended up being great players. I never knew how good I was because I got beat by my neighbors a lot. But once I got recruited and played in college (at Georgia Tech), I knew I could play.”
He turned pro in 2017, earned his PGA Tour card in 2019 and has just over $2 million in career earnings.
“It’s not always easy but you just keep playing and trying to get better,” he said.
