600 Holes in 16 Hours

In the world of golf marathoners, you have your tortoises and your hares. Several weeks ago I wrote about Bob Kurtz, an Alabama golf marathoner who completed a 500-hole outing. For Kurtz, though, it's not about playing X number of holes within a certain timeframe; it's about playing as long it takes to reach X number of holes. For the tortoise, it's about endurance, not speed. Bob played through the night, 39 hours straight, to hit 500 holes. (Kurtz still averaged less than 90 minutes per 18 holes.)

Ben Berger is a hare. The hares of the golf marathon world set a time limit - say sunup to sundown, or 16 hours - and see how many holes they can play within that timeframe.

And Ben Berger can play a lot of holes within a 16-hour timeframe. Six-hundred holes, in fact.

That's what Berger did - played 600 holes of golf in 16 hours - on June 20 to raise money for autism research and awareness. For those of you keeping score at home, that's an average of around 27 minutes for each 18-hole round of golf. All 33-plus of them.

Berger is the 31-year-old PGA Professional at Eberhart-Petro Golf Course in Mishawaka, Ind. This year is the fourth in which he's staged a marathon at his course, and his numbers have gone up each year:

• 2006: 437 holes in 14.5 hours
• 2007: 513 holes in 16 hours
• 2008: 527 holes in 16 hours
• 2009: 600 holes in 16 hours

In those four years, Berger's marathon has raised more than $140,000 for the Logan Center in South Bend, Ind., and the affiliated Ansari Center for Autism.

Did we mention that the Eberhart-Petro Golf Course remains open on the day of Berger's marathon? That means a group taking 4.5 hours to play 18 holes will be played through by Berger around nine times.

"This event takes a huge effort not only from myself, but my team," Berger said. "At any time during the day I can have up to 20 people helping me in my efforts."

Those people are taking care of things such as making sure a ball is teed when Berger reaches the next teeing ground; handing him a putter as he reaches a green; tending the flagstick; retrieving clubs that Berger drops as he races from one shot, into a golf cart, and onto the next; driving the cart that carries Berger and another one with support stuff; ball spotting and scorekeeping. Also included are "course clearers," folks who stay ahead of Berger making sure groups know he's coming and know to stand clear as he plays through.

On the Ansari Center for Autism Web site there are several pages that describe Berger's experience. One of those pages notes, "He will drink a case of gatorade. He will lose eight pounds. His hands will remain clenched for days afterward."

Said Berger: "It does take me about three days to recover." And that's despite receiving immediate chiropractic attention as soon as he walks off the final green.

So how does Berger play over the course of 600 holes? His low score was 65 during the 2009 marathon, his high score 80, and his average score 72.

"I do have the course set up the way I want," Berger said, "such as tee position and pin position. The course will play at about 6,000 yards that day."

Check out hesnotwaiting.com for more about Berger's day. In 2008, the local Fox affiliate put together a piece about Berger's marathon, which can viewed on YouTube.

See also:

• Logan Center
• Ansari Center for Autism
• About.com's Autism Guide