THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, June 11, 1996 TAG: 9606110457
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C4 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JIM DUCIBELLA, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: SUFFOLK LENGTH: 56 lines
Mike Dunavan joined a practice-range club at Honey Bee Golf Club last April for just one reason. He wanted to improve enough to make July the busiest month of his golfing career.
The 38-year-old teacher at Bayside's sixth-grade campus got his wish Monday by firing an 36-hole score of even-par 144 at Sleepy Hole. That led all qualifiers for the AMF Signet Open of Virginia at Willow Oaks in Richmond July 18-21 and tied him with collegian Troy Ferris for medalist for the State Amateur, July 1-5 at The Cascades Course in Hot Springs.
In between, Dunavan hopes to play in the Eastern Amateur at Elizabeth Manor.
``When you're a teacher, you've really only got one month a year to compete,'' he said. ``Everything I've done since April has been geared to that.''
Hardly any of the 68 would-be qualifiers knew Dunavan, who came back with a 4-under 68 in the afternoon round after a morning 76.
Ferris, a former Cox High star who attends Campbell College, shot 73-71.
Dunaway is a native North Carolinian who walked on at Pembroke State University only to become the school's No. 1 player by his senior season. In the early 1980s, he was a golf professional in Florida and the Virgin Islands before joining the Navy in 1986.
After receiving back his amateur status in '88, Dunavan won the All-Navy championship in 1989, '90 and '93 and was the Armed Forces champion in '89, the same year he finished 19th in the Canadian Amateur championship.
After leaving the Navy last year, he became a teacher. In April, he joined the level of Honey Bee's range club that allows him to hit all the balls he wants as often as he desires.
``Three, maybe four times a week since then, I've gone from school to the range as soon as my work was finished,'' Dunavan said. ``And I'd stay two, three hours, or until my concentration gave out. Usually, I'd get there about 5:30 and leave around 8 or 8:30.
``It's the first time I've ever practiced in earnest.''
Dunavan's afternoon 68 was at times bizarre. At the 483-yard, par-5 fifth hole, Dunavan badly mis-hit a third-shot wedge, leaving it on the front edge of the green and 30 feet from the cup. One of his playing partners, whose shot settled closer to the hole, asked Dunavan if he needed him to move his mark.
Dunavan declined, then inadvertently rolled his putt off the mark and into the hole for a birdie.
At the ninth hole, Dunavan hit his drive, then watched in horror as a non-competing player on the same hole mistakenly hit his ball onto the green. Dunavan caught up, wrestled the ball from the man's hand and testily asked him to walk back down the fairway and show him where the ball had landed. He made bogey, but finished first by making birdies at 15, 16 and 17, the last with a circus 18-foot putt that broke nearly 3 feet.
``I shot these identical scores last year in the Sleepy Hole Amateur,'' Dunavan said. ``The morning round shook me up. Shooting 76, when they only take eight for the Open, 12 for the Amateur, doesn't do much for your chances.
``But to shoot 68 on a course like this, that's very rewarding.''
As in one hot month of golf. by CNB