Determination and drive Champion blind golfer stacks up another win

BRIAN MACLEOD STEPS toward the tee. He takes a practice swing, and in seconds his Callaway ball is soaring some 230 yards.
"First one was good, right?" he says to his friend Andy Crowe.
Then the two jump into their golf cart and head to the next shot, chattering about which iron they’ll choose for MacLeod’s approach.
It’s Tuesday, and MacLeod, 52, is relaxed in the morning sun at the Mountain Golf and Country Club outside Truro.
He has every reason to be — he’s just returned to Truro with a coveted U.S. golf championship won at Columbus, Ga.
But his success differs from that of the others who play alongside him — because he can’t see.
"Sometimes I forget he’s blind," says Crowe, who’s been coaching MacLeod since 2003.
Since then, MacLeod has won enough tournaments to become one of the top five blind golfers in the world.
Crowe has travelled with MacLeod to Japan and to the United States, lining up the sweet shots that have helped take his friend to multiple victories. Along the way, other friends, including MacLeod’s wife Joanne and Kevin Lemmon, have also taken on coaching roles.
"It’s the ultimate team sport," MacLeod says.
"(Crowe) lines them up. I just hit the ball."
MacLeod defers to Crowe’s setup and advisory chats at the tees.
"You’re only as good as your coach," he says.
Before MacLeod’s win at the U.S. Blind Open last week, he took home the trophy at the Canadian Blind Open on Aug. 17 at his home Mountain course.
MacLeod’s odyssey from perfect vision to blindness began in 1988 when he was struck in the right eye with a puck while playing pickup hockey with pals. There was bleeding but he didn’t think it was that serious and he finished the game. It would turn out to be his last.
Turns out, the bleeding was behind his eyeball and he’d detached his retina, losing his sight in that eye.
Within weeks, MacLeod, then 29, returned to his job at a propane company in Truro. But then he hit his left eye on the corner of a wooden shelf while checking a serial number on a barbecue. He’d suffered a second detached retina, robbing him of his vision in that eye.
He had surgery in Halifax and regained partial sight in both eyes. Then he was referred to Toronto in an attempt to improve his sight. Some 3½ months and many surgeries later, he totally lost what he’d gained.
"In six months, I went from 20-20 vision to totally blind," he says.
He’s never seen his daughter Sarah, who is now 23.
"That’s the biggest regret in my life."
Several years later, he dropped in to see a friend at the Truro Golf Club. His chat with the club’s pro, the late Jim Crowdis, would change everything.
"Jim was the man who told me that, ‘Brian, you can still play.’ I said, ‘Jim, I’m totally blind, I can’t see, so how can I play?’ "
Crowdis told him to keep his front arm straight, so the club would always return to the ball.
By 1997, MacLeod was back in the game, with more passion than before, and he credits his victories and the awards he’s won to his determination, which includes taking shots into a net in his garage in winter.
"I’ve probably got more out of golfing blind than sighted," he says. "It’s become everything to me. Don’t let anyone ever tell you you can’t do it."
And he’s glad he didn’t let anyone or anything get in his way.
Back at the Mountain course Tuesday, he and Crowe are already at the seventh tee. He says other golfers are often shocked that he and Crowe can play 18 holes in about four hours, about the same time it takes many sighted golfers.
MacLeod, whose best score at Mountain is 86, doesn’t think he plays differently from a sighted golfer.
"I think I’m a golfer that’s blind," he says.
There are a couple of different rules, though. Blind golfers are allowed to ground their clubs in a hazard, for example, and their coaches are permitted to stand behind to follow the flight of the ball. But that’s it.
"I play with sighted golfers all the time," MacLeod says.
On the seventh green, he and Crowe count out the yards to the hole, taking yard-long paces while each holds on to one end of MacLeod’s club, so the golfer will have an idea of how far away his ball is from the cup.
"I read the break with my feet," he says.
"What’s the idea here, Andy?" MacLeod asks his coach.
"Smooth and easy, there’s nothing fancy here," Crowe replies.
MacLeod strikes the ball.
"Good, good shot!" Crowe says.
MacLeod already knows.
"I can tell by the sound of the clubhead," he says.
Half of this course was designed and added after MacLeod lost his sight, but he’s as familiar with the terrain as if he could see it himself.
"I can see it in my mind’s eye," he says. "In my mind, I can see every hole."
At other courses, he relies on Crowe to set up the scene.
"I get Andy to describe everything to me. He paints the picture. I like to get a picture in my mind."
MacLeod is set on winning the world blind golf championship at the Truro Golf Club next year.
He has been the runner-up twice but has never won the world title.
There are no big purses in blind golf like those won by the Rory McIlroys and Phil Mickelsons of the world. Except for free equipment from Callaway, MacLeod, who pays his own way to tournaments, has to be satisfied with winning a trophy.
But there’s another reward, like the one he hears on the seventh green when his nine-foot putt drops into the hole for a par.
"Love that sound," he says. "That’s just the best sound out there."

•Has won 46 of 71 tournaments, aims to win his 50th before playing in his 80th.
•Won the U.S. Blind Open in 2005 and again last month.
•Won the Canadian Blind Open in 2004 and 2008 and again last month.
•Has won the North American Match Play Championship three times.
•Has won the Canadian Blind Championship nine times.