This is how you know pro golfers are serious: They follow the game's stuffy protocol and wear long pants in August, in Tucson, even when the humidity index pushes into the tropical zone.
On Wednesday afternoon, the leading club pros from Arizona and Nevada played the final round of the $43,000 PGA Southwest Section championships at Oro Valley Country Club in a setting so grim and intense that you could almost hear the sweat trickling down their legs.
After all, the winner would receive $6,000 and, better yet, an exemption into February's $6 million FBR Open at the TPC Scottsdale.
On the 18th tee, tied for the lead, Phoenix pro Bob Blean drew his tee shot left — way left — into a small pond. He broke the silence when he bellowed a few unprintable adjectives and threatened to shot put his $500 driver all the way to Pusch Ridge.
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Without a word, Tucson pro Dean Vomacka completed an unlikely comeback to win the 2008 Southwest Section title by one stroke to collect the $6,000 and a spot in one of the PGA Tour's most prominent West Coast Swing events.
"It's pretty cool,'' said Vomacka, a tall and slim head pro at the tony Stone Canyon Club. "It's right up there with anything I've ever won.''
The 38-year-old Vomacka has lived a life typical of most pro golfers. "I've been a vagabond,'' he said, which best describes what it's like to chase steady (if almost unattainable) employment on the PGA Tour.
He spent one year on the Nationwide Tour and earned, ahem, about $3,500. He has tried minitours and the hell of Monday qualifying, and even this year, he flew to San Francisco in attempt to qualify for the U.S. Open.
But when he became the Stone Canyon's resident pro two years ago, Vomacka was so golf-savvy, so learned on the life of those chasing the tour, he knew he had arrived at a destination job.
"I love my life,'' he said Wednesday. "Being on the Nationwide Tour was an eye-opener. I really appreciate what I have now.''
Vomacka's three-day total of 68-71-68 (8-under-par 207) edged Blean and Phoenix pro Jay Frisch by one stroke. Wade Dunagan, executive director of the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championships, shot a dazzling final-round 64 Wednesday to finish fourth at 209.
The victory capped a remarkable two-week stretch, a rare double victory in which Vomacka first won the 2008 PGA Southwest Section, South Chapter title for Southern Arizona pros, and, this week, the regional championship.
The only other Tucson golfer to do so this decade was Jay Synkelma of El Conquistador Country Club.
"The thing with Dean is that he's got that extra gear, but he doesn't have to use it all the time,'' said Brent Newcomb, director of the PGA's Southern Chapter. "He knows when to use that gear and when not to use it.''
Vomacka looked as if he wouldn't win at the 15th hole Wednesday. His tee shot clipped a tree on the left side, dropping no more than 150 yards from the tee. But he was able to get up-and-down for a par from 80 feet to stay within a stroke of Blean.
He tied Blean at 17, dropping a 10-foot birdie putt, and then made par at 18 when Blean's tee shot rinsed into a murky pond.
"He didn't make the big mistake,'' said Blean, who was paid $2,950. "He's tough.''
Vomacka's most rewarding golf victory came at a Callaway Pro-Am event in Scottsdale a few years ago. He was paid $12,000 in cash, and typical of life in golf's minor leagues, also was given the use of a Chrysler for a year, which, he estimates was worth about $17,000.
Vomacka soon left the Silver Creek Golf Club in Scottsdale for the head pro job at the Stone Canyon Club, an exclusive retreat at the foot of the Tortolitas that bears no resemblance to the days he learned golf at a municipal driving range in the Bay Area.
"I used to beat 400 to 700 balls on the range all day,'' he said. He got hooked on golf. He has survived and moved on.
Being a club pro isn't what it used to be in most locales. In Tucson, former PGA Tour pros like Homero Blancas and Fred Marti used to be celebrity club pros who got a lucrative cut of greens fees, lessons, carts and a cut from the driving range.
But now most club pros under the vast PGA banner are strictly on salary. Sometimes the only way to boost your income is to win the annual shootouts against your region's rival club pros.
Thus, the intensity soars.
"Golf is very tough and very competitive at every level,'' Vomacka said. "Whenever you win, you take it and feel good about it.''
