Gary Player - Gary Players Black Book: 60 Tips on Golf, Business, and Life from the Black Knight

Copyright 2017 by Black Knight International

Foreword copyright 2017 by Lee Trevino

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Interior images courtesy of Black Knight Archives

Cover photo credit Black Knight Archives

ISBN: 978-1-5107-1680-3

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-1681-0

Printed in China

CONTENTS

A person like Gary Player does not come around very often. His tireless and selfless way of giving back to the world, especially to the disadvantaged, has been honored for decades and will no doubt be remembered by generations.

I am fortunate enough to call Gary a friend and, on many occasions, have been a firsthand witness to his altruism. Whether yelling across the golf range to a young boy to help him with his technique or stopping to chat with an old fan while he is in the middle of a round, Gary can connect with people from all walks of life.

Hence, I was honored when Gary asked me to write a foreword for his Little Black Book: 60 Tips on Golf, Business, and Life from the Black Knight .

He has dined with royalty, but also with the poorest of the poor in third-world countries. He brought himself, and his family, out of near poverty. Gary often talks about how he suffered like a junkyard dog, and how it made him face adversity head-on.

If ever there were a man people should take advice from, its Gary. And that is what you will find in this bookstraightforward solutions garnered from a lifetime travelling the world that can help people of all ages and all walks of life. Enjoy.

Lee Trevino

W hat do I do?

Every one of us asks this question on a daily basis.

It doesnt matter whether were trying to negotiate our way through the minefield that parenthood can be, or on the golf course with a one-shot lead playing a difficult par-four closing hole, or sitting in the office mulling over a big business decision, we all get to the point where we ask this question: What do I do?

I remember very well asking this question at a critical time early in my life.

I was 17 years old. I had finished high school at King Edward VII in Johannesburg. My love for golf was growing, and I believed I knew what the next step in my life would be.

Im going to turn professional, I told my father. He was shocked by my decision.

While my mother was suffering from cancer and shortly before she passed away when I was eight years old, she had made my father promise that I would go to university after school.

And now here I was flipping the script.

My father was devastated, and no doubt he was asking the same question of What do I do? in terms of how best to advise and support me as his son, but while feeling like he was also not betraying his wifes dying wish.

Having witnessed my fathers reaction, I also began to question the decision that had seemed so certain to me when it first crossed my mind. What do I do? I began to ask myself. Do I follow my passion? If I do, it could end up making my father very sad. Or do I ignore my passion and go to university?

What do I do?

Im 81 years old now, and often I still think back to that 17-year-old boy and wonder how on earth he was able to make that decision.

I dont have a foolproof way for making such decisions. But I like to think I have something far better than a magic recipe for decision making. I have a life of good experience. I have a vault of decisionsgood and badthat I have made over the years, and I can learn from these, as I still do to this day.

When it comes to my golf, I have always maintained, The harder I practice, the luckier I get. Well, I believe the same when it comes to making decisions. The more decisions I make, the better I become at making decisions.

Ive learned over time that you cant just expect yourself to make great decisions. In my case, I believe its more a collection of things that need to come together for me to make a good decision.

It takes life experience, and the wisdom this brings. But then you also need to be careful about this, because the wisdom of your life is not necessarily the wisdom of somebody elses life.

Plus, in order to eventually figure out how to make the right decisions, you need to get a few wrong. Its what we mean when we refer to learning from our mistakes.

From a golfers perspective, its like hitting balls on the range. A golfer heads to the driving range not to hit perfect shots. On the contrary, he or she heads to the range to work on the bad shots. And youve got to hit some bad shots to know what you need to work on.

Ultimately, you begin to develop what people often call that little voice in their heads, which takes into account past experiences and uses them to advise you going forward.

Over the years I became better at hearing this voice and made my decisions accordingly. They werent always easy decisions to make, and many people thought they were the wrong decisions, but I knew that if I listened to that voice they would be the right decisions for me.

Even recently I had to listen very carefully to that voice when a number of other voices were suggesting otherwise.

I was one of those who campaigned for golf to be readmitted to the Olympic Games, and it was a proud moment when this became a reality.

I thought our games leading professionals would embrace this opportunityan opportunity that was denied so many of us for generations.

I wouldve given anything to play for South Africa in an Olympics and to add a gold medal to my career. Though South Africa was excluded from Olympic participation from 1964 to 1988 because of apartheid, I always followed the Olympics with great interest. I remember attending the 1956 Olympics and meeting Jesse Owens, and it was an incredible moment for me. I have always been fascinated by this gathering of the worlds greatest athletes on one stage.

Yet in the 2016 Summer Olympics, we saw the withdrawals of golfs biggest names worldwide.

One of the main arguments from the players who were withdrawing was the supposed threat posed by the Zika virus.

Im sorry. While I remain respectful of the personal opinions regarding this virus, it just wasnt a good enough excuse for me. I travelled for 64 years to countries with malaria, polio, typhoid, and yellow fever.