The Road to Professional Golf
Introduction to Golf
Ever since Peter has been little he enjoyed sports and started competing at a very young age. He first played ice hockey followed by volleyball, table tennis and basketball. None of these really stuck with him longer than two or three years. Golf interested him very early on since he first saw it on TV which was not very often in Slovakia. When Peter was 13 his parents sent him to England during the summer time to work on his English. The host family he stayed with played golf and took him to a driving range where he had the opportunity to swing a golf club for the first time. After returning home Peter and his dad started taking lessons at a local driving range. Peter quickly realized that this is the sport that he wants to be playing.
Junior Golf
The first year that Peter played golf, he received an award for most improved player of the year from the Slovak Golf Union. Golf in Slovakia was in its early stage when Peter picked up the game and there was almost no competition, tournaments or courses he could play on. His parents were very supportive of his passion for golf and drove him to practice and tournaments in Austria. Peter became a member at a course in Austria, Golf Club Hainburg. The game there was almost fully developed in Austria and there was no lack of competition or practice facilities. Peter worked hard on his game and by age 17 and 18 he won back to back a junior golf tour series in Austria called NOKIA Cup. He also won the Slovak Amateur Tour series where best golfers from Slovakia competed when he was only 18 years old.
College Golf in United States
In year 2005, when Peter was 19 he became interested in the possibility of playing college golf in the United States. From the offers he had, he ended up picking Cameron University, a NCAA DII school in Lawton, Oklahoma. The head coach there, Jerry Hrnciar, had over 30 year experience and the team was performing very well.
The scores on top of the leader board at college tournaments were well under par and what would be enough to win in Slovakia was good to finish in the middle of the field. Peter took it as a challenge and by the end of his freshmen year he finished T7 at the superregional tournament.
During Peter’s sophomore and junior year, his game was constantly improving. During his junior year, Peter went on to win some tournaments including the Regional Championship in Austin, TX and received the All-American award. Throughout the summer of 2008, Peter won all tournaments in Slovakia and became both, the national stroke-play and match-play champion. It became clear that competition back home was no match for Peter’s most improved game.
Peter’s senior year started very well but due to a wrist injury he had he was only able to play a couple of tournaments in the fall and after that he was out for the year. Peter received a medical red shirt which meant one extra year of college golf. After Peter got back on the course he picked up where he left off earning All-American award and ending his college career with a T8 place at the NCAA DII National Championship in Indianapolis.
Transition from Amateur to Professional Golf
Peter was eager to play more golf and compare his game to the best. During Peter’s amateur career there was not one time he had been beaten by a player from Slovakia in any of the international tournaments he played in. The end of Peter’s college career meant that he was no longer required to maintain amateur status. By the end of the summer 2010 Peter decided to give up his amateur status and play golf as a professional, doing so he became the only playing PRO in Slovakia.
Peter started his PRO career at the Czech Open 2010, a European Tour tournament which he qualified for earlier during the summer while he was still an amateur. Peter was the first Slovak professional to play in a European Tour event.
