So I , I'd say those two things are probably the biggest pieces of advice and from my mentors as well as coaches . So some of the top challenges that I'd say I faced was a little bit less of the physical and more of a timing situation . I played , uh , baseball and hockey up until my freshman year of high school and didn't really start playing competitive golf until my freshman year .
But golf wasn't really a big part of my life until freshman year . So when , when that challenge , I kind of had to face that head on and I think just outwork , everyone was something that wasn't an option . I had to do it if I wanted to play at the next level and practicing more than everyone practicing more efficiently than everyone getting more reps in .
So it really requires a lot of time management and speaking with professors ahead of time on what lectures are gonna be missed , what content will be missed , potentially , exams , quizzes , presentations that need to be structured around our tournament schedules . And I think the biggest way that maybe I've faced that challenge is at the beginning of each semester . I'm very intentional with professors letting them know my situation but not just letting them know that , oh , I'm an athlete .
But I really need to be extra precise with how I allocate my time because it was either that or I don't play a sport in college because baseball and hockey were out the window at that point . So just really , I'd say that challenge uh did take a mental toll on me and my family just not really knowing whether I'd be playing division one sports because baseball and hockey were such a big part of my life . But I think when I realized what my objective was and what the challenge was just facing it head on and knowing I'm gonna have to say no to certain things in my life if I really wanna play college golf .
There's not much separation between everyone but inside 8 ft , if you can really hone in those short putts and make a very high percentage of them , that's where you're gonna gain strokes on the field . So that's been kind of an area of focus for me is course management and then putting inside 8 ft , balancing academics with a very busy , uh , golf schedule is one of the hardest things I've noticed in , in college so far , one of my biggest challenges and I think it really takes saying no to a lot of things we're traveling 456 days in a row and getting back to campus and having only 1 to 2 days of class before leaving on another trip . So it really requires a lot of time management and speaking with professors ahead of time on what lectures are gonna be missed , what content will be missed , potentially , exams , quizzes , presentations that need to be structured around our tournament schedules .
