July/August 2008

The Doctor of Second Chances

Continued from page 2

By Thomas Wailgum

But in Cambodia, he picked the game back up. And on a trip to the States in 2003, he got a chance to try out the pros' driving range at Florida's famed TCP Sawgrass with his brother, a longtime friend of U.S. PGA Tour pro Mark McCumber. While ­Shef-tall was hitting practice shots, McCumber and fellow PGA pro Paul Azinger complimented him on his technique and compared him to some famous players. After inviting him back to play 18 holes a week later, McCumber told him that with some lessons and serious practice, he might be able to compete professionally. "Believe me, I couldn't believe what I was hearing. Pro golfers don't usually do that," recalls Sheftall, who hadn't played golf seriously in 30 years.

Sheftall took the advice to heart. In Striking It Rich, he describes high-stakes money matches with Cambodian governmental and military officials, the grind of Q School, and life on the Malaysian PGA Tour. He also weaves in stories from his surgical practice, which provide a rich backdrop for his improbable golf story.

Virtually all touring professionals play golf in college; at MIT, Sheftall steered clear of it altogether, though he played varsity tennis and lacrosse and earned a spot on the crew team. Most touring pros have received countless lessons from professionals; Sheftall's had two. And while his competitors spend the time between tour events perfecting their chipping or putting, he is in surgery, doing such things as reconstructing the upper body of a 15-year-old Cambodian girl who hasn't moved her arms in five years because they fused to her torso after another child spilled hot oil on her.

"The golf-tour guys know me as one of their own who happens to also be a doctor, which blows them away," says Sheftall, who's called "Doc" on tour. He's played in about 20 events so far and is trying to compete in nine in 2008. "I play tour events when I can, and I practice when I can," he says, alluding to Cambodia's limited golf facilities, many with dirt fairways and bumpy greens.

Now 51, Sheftall competes against men half his age who live and die by how well they play. "It's at such a high level, and the subtleties between surviving and not surviving are so slim," he says. "Everybody has to be completely focused on what they're doing." His other career helps Sheftall maintain his perspective. It's "not the end of the world when you make a mistake playing a sport," he says, "because if you're doing things that really do matter to someone's life on a regular basis, you realize that whether I shoot a 77 or 71 really only matters to me." As he writes in his book, "Pressure is not a side hill four-footer to make a professional cut. It's shaping your only brittle porcelain eye prosthesis on a rough sidewalk while a 15-year-old girl and her mother wait to see if the teasing will stop."