Refusing to admit defeat, they fought like blood brothers long after the sun gave up and went to bed.
Quit? No way. On a hot summer night in Georgia three years ago, surrender was not a viable option, because it would mean taking the walk of shame alongside an identical twin who had battled to be first since the day both these fierce competitors greeted this world from the womb.
So David and Maxwell Ford dueled with putters, their home golf course in Atlanta empty except for them and the moon.
“It was like 9:20 p.m., almost pitch black, and we stayed out there and kept putting. Nobody wanted to be the first to leave,” David said Thursday, recalling a putting contest with the intensity of a sword fight.
But all these years after a winner was grudgingly declared, is it finally safe to let the sibling-rivalry truth be known?
“I don’t know if David would tell you this, but I was way down in that putting contest, And when we compete, whoever’s losing is not happy. I’m the one that didn’t want to leave. I figured if I stayed out there long enough, I had to win one time,” Maxwell confessed, as we stood outside the clubhouse at Cherry Hills Country Club.
The 123rd U.S. Amateur Championship is being contested this week on the same hallowed grounds where Arnold Palmer led the charge of his raucous army by overcoming a seven-stroke deficit to win the 1960 U.S. Open. And you can bet Phil Mickelson was delighted when he took home the U.S. Am trophy from Colorado in 1990.
If I’m reading my golf history correctly, tradition suggests that once every generation, a generational talent leaves his imprint on Cherry Hills. But this week, the U.S. Am threatened to become a family barbecue.
The weather? Scorching. And the Ford brothers? Sizzling. Against a field featuring more than 300 of the best young players in the sport, David and Maxwell awoke Thursday needing two match play victories apiece to hold their own private putting contest at this prestigious tournament.
“When the bracket came out, my family sat down and figured out we could play in the quarterfinals,” Maxwell said.
For 21 years, it’s been almost impossible to separate David and Maxwell, much less tell them apart on the putting green in the moonlight. Helpful hint: Maxwell is right-handed; while David is a lefty. They are the two males in a set of triplets; rambunctious boys who grew up playing roller hockey and basketball as teammates until they simultaneously fell hard for their father’s love of golf as teenagers.
After a 10-minute chat with each of them, however, you begin to discover guys that have been mirror images since conception did grow into their own skin as distinctly different southern gentlemen.
In the center of the fairway, in the heat of competition, David seeks peace.
“I have scripture from the Bible going through my head, before every shot, when I’m behind the ball: Psalms 37:23-24,” he said, citing verses that could’ve been written for golfers that inevitably find the rough: The Lord makes firm the steps of the one that delights in him. Though he may stumble, he will not fall …
On the other hand, when Maxwell tees up the ball, he has a hankering to wrassle, with no holds barred.
“I love everything about golf … except maybe bogeys,” he told me. “And I really, really like being in contention, because my body likes it and usually performs well. Adrenaline makes me more locked in. My misses are smaller. In match play, it’s like you’re tied for the lead every single time you go to the first tee. It’s a fight or flight thing for me.”
During any given round, golf can be a good walk spoiled. But on this breezy, bone-dry day in Denver, the U.S. Am was a marathon, requiring the survivors to endure 36 holes capable of messing with any competitor from the doubts in his head to the bottom of his blistering toes.
David, ranked fourth in the world amateur rankings, cruised during his morning match, scoring a 5-and-4 knockout of Grant Smith from Iowa. Maxwell pulled an upset with a 3-and-2 victory over Nick Gabrelcik, the 10th-ranked amateur in the world,
This sport, however, was invented to remind us nobody’s perfect.
During his afternoon match, nothing went right for Maxwell after taking the first hole from Parker Bell, and he fell 5-and-4 in the Round of 16. David found himself in a dogfight with Ben James, ranked sixth among the world’s amateurs.
With Maxwell encouraging him from the gallery, David found the rough with a 3-iron off the tee on No. 18, surrendered a one-hole advantage and lost the match when James birdied the first extra hole.
The first guy there to console David as he walked off the green? His brother.
“Good playing,” Maxwell said. “Proud of you.”.
On the long walk back to the clubhouse, the Ford brothers walked in lockstep.
Inseparable. As always. In victory or defeat.
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