I've had the privelege of playing with Gary Player and Ernie Els.

Not too many people realise just how special Gary is. In 1967 he and his family were holidaying in our town on the Natal south coast near Durban and Gary always used to turn up at our club to play with the members. The club had made his dad, Harry, very welcome when he was at the seaside and had let the young junior play to his hearts content. His view was that it was a pleasure to play golf for fun with ordinary golfers and he invariably ended up with the club captain and 2 others while almost the rest of the club made up the gallery. After playing Friday (68), Saturday (67), Sunday (67) he walked across from the clubhouse to the practice tee where I was hitting balls with another youngster and asked us if we'd like a game the next afternoon. Naturally the answer was "Yes, please!" We then found a 4th and had the nicest possible game one could have the next day. Gary was very long then and hit the ball to places that others just dreamed of. He made a 65 with seemingly very little effort and was laid back and relaxed all the time telling us stories of life on tour.

30 years later I was at Fancourt (venue of Presidents Cup) on business and had a New Zealander colleague with me. We spotted gary waiting to be taken to the airport and the Kiwi said that he'd love Gary's autograph for his pub. I said that he should ask him. We walked across and I reintroduced myself and the kiwi and explained that he like his autograph. Gary was as gracious as ever, asked the porter to get his golf bag out of the trunk, took out a brand new glove and cap, autographed the glove and gave it to my colleague.

Gary is a great example to all professional sportsmen particularly when it comes to putting something back into the game.

My experience with Ernie was to play in a pro-am with him in 1992 just before he burst on the scene. He was a pleasure to play with, very complimentary to eberyone and just a wee bit shy. He'd just done pretty well at the British open, playing with John Cook in the final round and was in contention 'til the last 9 (Nick Price won). We asked him how he managed to be so cool - his reply "I've never been more nervous in my life!"

It's experiences like these that build one's heroes and I'm not ashamed to say that at 62 I still have some including Jack and Arnie, Tiger and the ultimate sportsman, Jim Furyk who endeared himself to all in SA by being gracious enough to mark a fellow pro's card in the Nedbank challenge after he had disqualified himself the previous day. Others who have been d-q'd in the past packed up and left the last player to play alone!