The club captain. Generally, it’s a role for someone who’s been at the club for many years. Often, if they’re not retired and on a decent pension, they’re your CEO types. Deep pockets, basically, which you need when you’re voted in to be the face of the club for a whole year.
This is not always the case, though. Why should it be this way? Why not have a younger face in the position, someone eager and full of energy to represent the club and take it forward? This is what’s happened at The Burstead Golf Club in Billericay.
Joey Grogan is just 24 years old. He looks more than ready to play golf for 365 consecutive days if required. Despite being a member of the Essex club for just three years, in January, 200 of his fellow members surrounded the 1st tee and lined the fairways to watch him get the traditional Captain’s Drive-In underway.
“There was a big roar when I got on the tee,” laughs Joey. “Everyone was shouting my name and whatnot. I was absolutely bricking it. Fortunately I sent one down the left side. I had these nightmares leading up to the event that I was going to top one off the tee and never hear the end of it.”
Joey holds himself together at the Captain’s Drive-In in January
(Image credit: The Burstead Golf Club)
He’ll need to get used to the attention, of course, for everyone wants to play with the captain. This is going to be extremely busy for the young commercial banker, especially with a few big county competitions in the diary, not to mention a packed social events calendar.
So, how does a 24-year-old, who only took up the game in his late teens, find himself golf club captain, a role that is traditionally occupied by longstanding members at least twice his age?
“I used to think golf was a boring, an old man’s sport,” he says. “I’d never even set eyes on a golf club. In fact, I was very much on the side of that argument that golf was not even a sport.
“Then I had a couple of concussions playing rugby and therefore had to look for another vice. My grandmother gifted me my own set of clubs when I turned 21, which enabled me to become absolutely obsessed with golf.
“After finishing university, I had a full year on my hands before I had to start a graduate scheme. I think I played something like 382 rounds…
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