There is a nationwide organization of senior golfers called the U.S. Senior Challenge, which was founded in 1985. Each year its board of directors selects an individual to receive the “Challenge Man of the Year” award. The honor is presented to “a person whose life has been exemplary in family, business and golf.”
This year that person is Skip Snow, who at age 72 recently won his 21st Dayton Country Club championship.
A native of Springfield, Snow is a graduate of Miami University who played on the MU basketball team from 1962-65. He won the City Men’s Amateur Match Play golf championship in 1978 when it was a prestigious event.
He won the Ohio Senior Amateur championship in 1998 and 2001 and for a third time in 2009 when he was 66.
Since retiring from his position with an accounting firm 14 years ago, Snow has accepted invitations to play in many prestigious senior golf events across the United States. He also teed it up twice in the British Amateur.
He was inducted in the Dayton Amateur Golf Hall of Fame in 2001. Each year the winner of the Miami Valley Team Invitational receives the “Skip Snow Cup.”
• This is a big week for the area’s competing golfers.
The Miami Valley Golf Association will conduct its Senior Metropolitan and Mid-Amateur championships at Walnut Grove Country Club on Thursday and Friday.
Jeffrey Scohy is the defending Mid-Amateur champion and Pete Betzold will be going for an unusual sweep, having won the Metropolitan title at Beavercreek Golf Club in July.
Others playing at Walnut Grove include: Jerry Zwiesler, the defending Mid-Amateur senior division champion and Tim Sorrows, who won the Metro Senior title in 2014. Former Metro champs Ron Eubel, Bob Eardley, Bob Jones and Dale Shires also are entered.
Meanwhile, seven players from the Dayton area have entered the Wednesday qualifier at Kenwood Country Club in Cincinnati for the U.S. Senior Amateur Championship at Hidden Creek Golf Club in Egg Harbor Township, N.J.
The seven are: Bob Eardley of Fairborn, Tom Keltner of Germantown and Daytonians Ron Eubel, Doug Gage, Gary Huls, Roger Johnson and Dave Novotny.
On Thursday there will be 68 players competing in the U.S. Mid-Amateur qualifier at The Heritage Club in Mason.
Former Springboro resident Kevin Grabeman of Columbus, Pete Samborsky of Bellbrook, Scott Thompson of Miamisburg, Gordie Mackenzie of Dayton and Betzold of West Chester will join David Clancy and Paul Stone of Springboro in competing for a spot in the Mid-Am Oct. 3-8 at Johns Island Club in Vero Beach, Fla.
Chip shots
• Sycamore Creek Country Club is hosting a Pro-1 Am event on Monday.
• The itinerary for the Dayton Amateur Hall of Fame Day on Sept. 27 at Kittyhawk Golf Course includes a four-man scramble open to the public at 10:30 a.m., a reception for the inductees at 3 p.m., dinner at 4 p.m. and the induction ceremony at 5 p.m.
The golfing fee is $25 and the dinner/awards ceremony fee is also $25.
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