A random internet search introduced one of the world’s best milers to a sport he never knew existed. 

 

As Nick Willis scanned the Wikipedia pages of some of history’s most famous runners back in 2008, he happened upon the page of the former American record holder in the mile. When Willis scrolled to the bottom of 3:47 miler Steve Scott’s bio, he found a seemingly random blurb about the 1983 World Championship silver medalist. 

 

“It had an excerpt at the bottom of it that said he actually was the world record holder for the fastest speed golf (round). He did like 18 holes in 29 minutes all with a 3-iron and a score of 95. I was like, ‘Wow, that’s pretty cool, maybe I’ll give that a go,’” Willis said. 

 

Willis had just won his first Olympic medal in Beijing, and decided to try out the much quicker version of a game that is usually played at a snail’s pace. The 1500 specialist had grown up playing golf in New Zealand, and was inspired by Scott to try it with a different spin- 18 holes of golf, completed as quickly as possible, by running to the ball after every shot. 

 

Upon his first impression of the underground phenomenon, Willis loved it. As a father and husband in addition to a full-time professional athlete, golf at its usual tempo was not realistic for the Kiwi very often, but being able to cover the 18 holes in the same time it normally takes to play 3 or 4, well, that was much more attractive. Plus, and this fact has been echoed by many other speed golfers, Willis actually played better when he had to run after his ball instead of over-thinking the game like most people do. In his first ever go at speed golf, Willis shot a very respectable 79 in 43 minutes. 

 

“I’m totally better actually when I play speed golf. I don’t have the concentration time anymore that I had when I was a kid, part of that is I have a lot of other things going on in my life. To be able to focus for four hours is difficult for me,” Willis said. 

Willis allows himself a few more clubs than Scott, he uses four in a typical round- a 4-wood, 6-iron, 9-iron, and sand wedge, but he still carries less than the seven club limit so that he can take advantage of his strength in the running.

 

The rules of the sport are simple. Just like in regular golf, the player tries to get the ball in the hole with as few strokes as possible, only in speed golf your number of shots is just part of the equation. The rest of your total is reached by adding the minutes and seconds it takes to finish the round, with the clock starting immediately after the first shot. Players go off by themselves so that they can compete at their own pace. 

 

Time and shots are equal in this game, so a fair amount of strategy goes into deciding how to attack the course. Take too much time over the ball, carry too many clubs, or just simply tire while running, and one loses ground no matter how good of a golfer the person is. 

 

Just like how Willis encountered the game, the sport of speed golf began to first gain traction back in 1979 after Steve Scott shot 95 in just 29 minutes using only a 3-iron, which is impressive considering that many weekend hackers struggle to shoot better scores taking four hours and using 14 clubs. Scott did it with one club, and covered roughly four miles while running shot-to-shot. The notoriety Scott received from his record-breaking run exposed the sport to the masses, and thus he’s largely credited for founding the modern game. 

 

While Willis had success in his first attempt in 2008, he didn’t become aware of actual speed golf competitions until years later, when his friend and former NCAA champion Lee Emanuel told him about the 2012 Speed Golf World Championships, which were being shown on CBS as part of the build up to the 2013 Masters. 

 

“They managed to get it on CBS…that’s how a lot of us that now consider ourselves speed golfers got involved,” Willis remembered. “We all emailed the organizer and said ‘we want to be part of that next year.’”

 

Willis not only took part at the 2013 Speed Golf World Championships in Bandon, Oregon, which were held in late October, but he finished remarkably high in the two-day competition. After day one in his first ever tournament, Willis found himself in sixth place out of 25 competitors with a score of 130:20 after shooting 86 in 44:20, and only faded to 13th on the second day after shooting 97. Still though, Willis loved the competition aspect of the sport, which also served to push him back into a training cycle after a long track season.

 

“In the past it was good for me when I was struggling for motivation after the season ended, it provided an incentive to put the running shoes on… Just having that carrot out in front of you when you’ve got another sport that you’re doing, so inadvertently you’re still building up a little bit of fitness.” 

 

Willis returned to the World Championships in 2014, finishing 17th, and he’s back at it again for this year’s event in Chicago, which took place yesterday and today. The conditions were expectedly tough in the Windy City on Monday, and Willis found himself in 12th entering the final day after totaling 139:09 yesterday. 2013 Speed Golf World Champion Rob Hogan of Ireland led through Monday’s round after covering the course with a 125:09 score. 

Tough start to the Speedgolf World champs, but after figuring out greens, 5 pars on the back 9. 92 in 47mins. Mid field

— Nick Willis (@nickwillis) October 19, 2015

As Willis has competed in each of the last three years at these unique World Championships, he’s witnessed the sport grow as participants have taken it on themselves to create new speed golf events. 

 

“Now there are about 15 different national championships of speed golf that have spawned off that…It’s very entertaining, and it’s an incredible amount of strategy…there’s a potentially exciting future,” he said. Willis’ popularity back home in New Zealand led to the formation of the first ever New Zealand Speed Golf Open this past February, where Willis put together his best two-day total ever with consecutive scores of 122.  

 

For Willis individually, he doesn’t see himself improving much on his current speed golf ability since his training schedule prevents him from putting much time into the game, especially in an Olympic year, but this unique hobby offers him the competitive push he craves during a time of year that he doesn’t receive that from running. And now that he’s a regular of sorts on the speed golf circuit, the miler looks forward to meeting up with his fellow “Hit. Run. Repeat.” buddies each year. 

 

“I’ve built up a lot of friends now within the small speed golf community and I look forward to catching up with them and having a bit of fun out on the links,” Willis said.

UPDATE: Willis shot a second round 84 in 44:51 to total 128:51 on Tuesday. His two day total of 268 was good for 10th place at the Speed Golf World Championships!