Tom Newton Jr. is going for No. 5.
He’s the four-time defending club champion at Valparaiso Country Club, and only one other golfer in VCC’s history dating back 1922 has won five straight.
That would be Chuck Welter, who won the club title a total of 13 times.
As for Newton, he can shoot 69 at VCC with one eye closed.
In fact, he did when we played for this story, detailing his golf history in between swings.
Newton is a throwback. He is the face of Valparaiso Country Club, deeply involved in the fabric of the place. He is on the golf committee, plays in their weekly men’s league, and is part of a regular Friday game.
And he is just 37.
In this era, club members skew to an older demographic. They are the ones who remember when the clubs were a bustling home for everything golf-related.
Valparaiso Country Club matters to Newton. The course matters to him. The club championship matters to him.
These are not the golden days for private clubs. It’s a struggle to keep members.
It’s not cheap, roughly $400 per month for a full family membership.
Thirty years ago, the best golfers in town, the ones who could afford it, played at their club. They paid for quality and privacy. It was about access and status.
These days, those same golfers have about a half-dozen options for good courses. With more choices and less time, it’s difficult to avoid the inevitable churn.
It’s been a decent year for VCC, though.
The course is in fantastic shape, and it has gained about 40 new members.
Still, it was difficult to get the best players together for the championship.
At Newton’s behest, it was switched from the second week in August to this weekend.
The top players, like Dane Brown and Bryan Bennett, had conflicts with the early dates. Bennett, once the assistant pro at VCC, is good enough to beat Newton. So is Brown.
There are others who could scare him.
Newton didn’t want to play without being pushed.
During his four-year title run, he has trailed only once. One year, he opened with an even-par 72 and was not atop the leaderboard. Nevertheless, he won easily.
Like any championship golfer, Newton prefers to be challenged, which is a universal theme for the guys competing for their club championships.
Newton is a scratch golfer, and according to the USGA, only 13 percent of the golfers fall into that category.
It’s rare air.
“It still gets your juices going,” he said of playing in the club championship.
Newton fell for VCC and golf in high school when he started working there, cleaning up carts and putting away bags.
He played baseball until his junior year, but then switched to golf. He had friends who played and he hung around with them.
Yes, the switch from baseball player to serious golfer was fairly easy for him.
He played on the golf team his junior and senior years at Valparaiso High School, and got good enough to think about going into the golf business, but he decided against it.
Fact is, club professionals rarely play due to other obligations, and Newton didn’t want to be that guy.
He moved to California out of college for a couple of years and returned to Valparaiso in 2004. He has been a member at VCC ever since.
Newton rarely goes to the range. He plays at VCC two or three times a week and in local outings, where someone recruits him to try to be their long-drive player.
“I’m not a practicer,” he said. “You couldn’t get me to hit a bag of balls for fun.”
He has dabbled with the idea of playing in some of the Indiana amateur events, but he knows it would take another level of commitment for him to compete. He’s just not interested.
He is comfortable at VCC, where he knows every blade of grass on the course and every putt.
And where he has a permanent parking spot until someone else can figure out how to take it away.
Twitter:@MikeHuttonPT
18 HOLES WITH …
Who: Tom Newton Jr., the reigning club champion at Valparaiso Country Club
Where: Valparaiso Country Club.
What he shot: 3-under-par 69.
His best round at VCC: 65.
Golfing goals: He’d like to win the Porter Amateur. Newton has finished second and third in the tournament.
Handicap: Zero.
Best Drive of the Round: On No. 6, he hit one 324 yards on the par-5 494-yard hole. He had 170 yards to the hole.
