Mackenzie puts in the hard yards and completes charity crusade in double-quick time

It wasn’t quite the 500 miles that The Proclaimers chanted about but Peter Mackenzie’s bold charity drive certainly clocked them up. To paraphrase the lyrics of those singing Reid twins, “when I’m golfing, I’m gonna be the man who’s golfing hard for you.”

Mackenzie certainly put in the hard yards. After nearly 30 miles, seven courses and 553 shots, the intrepid Sale Golf Club PGA professional completed his epic East Lothian challenge for Breast Cancer UK while raising over £6800, with more to be piled into the pot over the next couple of weeks.

It was a mighty effort but Mackenzie took it all in his stride. In fact, his stride was so brisk, he was finished well ahead of schedule.

“It went better than expected,” he said as he reflected on an excursion that took in the three courses at Gullane as well as Longniddry, Craigielaw and the Fidra and Direlton at Archerfield Links. “I had five rounds tucked under my belt before midday. I wasn’t supposed to be teeing-off at Craigielaw until 12:50pm but I’d actually finished there before 12. I had time for a two-hour lunch. It was nice to have time to spare instead of time to panic.”

Mackenzie got his charity challenge up-and-running just after 4am as he burst out of the traps like a greyhound. “I was finished the three courses at Gullane by 8am,” he said of a series of rampaging rounds that could’ve got him a speeding ticket from the local constabulary. “I was averaging one hour 25 minutes for each round.

“At Gullane, the first four holes were in the dark and the longest club I hit for those first four holes was a 9-iron. I only took six clubs anyway and no woods. My 2-iron was working nicely so I put that in the bag alongside a 7-iron, a 9-iron, a couple of wedges and a putter.”

Playing at running pace, while relying on his ingrained golfing instinct, Mackenzie chalked off the holes at a furious rate. “As daylight came and I started getting warmed up, the scoring improved too and I went 92, 78 and 69 at the three Gullane courses,” he noted. “Overall, I averaged 79 which is not bad considering you’re just running round and hitting it. Sometimes, the less time you have to think, the easier it is. The hardest part is putting. You just run onto the green and hit it. You’re not really looking at a line. So, there were quite a few three or four putts.

“When I was playing Gullane No 2, I was on the 7th and out in the Forth there was a cruise liner going into dock. I then played Gullane No 3, Longniddry and Craigielaw and when I got to Archerfield, the liner was still going into port. Either it was going very slow or I was going very fast.

“When I was at Longniddry, I phoned in to Craigielaw to let them know I was ahead of schedule.  This was about 9:30am. They thought I was just finishing my first round but I was finishing my fourth. They were great though and got me sorted with food and everything and I went out and it was like the parting of the sea on every hole. People playing in front of me just stood aside and let me though.”

Mackenzie remains eternally grateful to everybody who aided a charity venture which didn’t just raise funds. “My heart rate rose to 160 beats per minute,” he said. He didn’t just burn the calories, either. He incinerated them. “We worked through 9,500 calories,” he added. A couple of celebratory libations in the Bonnie Badger bar and restaurant by 8pm at the end of a long golfing crusade was thoroughly deserved.

The great Jack Nicklaus once suggested that, “golfers have a tendency to be very masochistic.” Mackenzie will probably agree with that particular observation.

“I want to do something more sadistic next year,” he said with a chuckle. “This was very satisfying because I was raising funds for a great cause but it was good for me personally, both mentally and physically. I’m thinking of a bigger, week-long challenge next time, so watch this space.”

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