Kosowick drives way to fourth-place finish

Brian Kosowick got a first-hand look Saturday at some of the golfers who give new meaning to the phrase “driving the ball off the tee.”
But while the 19-year-old Kitchen Creek member was amazed at how far some of them could drive the ball, he didn’t look out of place one bit, either.
In fact, the 6’6”, 230-pound right-hander finished fourth in the 24-player field at the ReMax district qualifier in Saskatoon, Sask., falling short of second place–and a trip to the North America event in Mesquite, Nev. in October–by just a single yard.
His 310-yard drive in the final round wasn’t quite good enough for the title, which was won on a 318-yard blast by a Swift Current, Sask. golfer (who also had the top drive overall of 340 yards despite very wet conditions).
Each golfer was given six drives in the first round, with their longest one counting. The top driver in each division then advanced to the final round, where each one again had six drives.
Kosowick unleashed a 322-yard drive on his second-last attempt in the first round to advance to the finals.
He had earned a berth at Saskatoon by winning a similar event in Atikokan in June. Russ Desserre of Atikokan, who was in Kosowick’s division out there, placed third in the first round and failed to advance.
(He had received a special exemption to the Saskatoon event because he had organized the contest in Atikokan).
Kosowick said it became very clear early on that these guys took their driving seriously, with some of them concentrating solely on this type of competition during the year.
“It was my first time at one of these and that was probably my problem,” said Kosowick, who will be attending the University of Guelph this fall.
“But it was a great experience and a lot of fun, especially talking and getting to know the guys,” he enthused, adding he wished to thank Kitchen Creek for helping him out financially with the trip.
Kosowick said many of the golfers came with a plethora of drivers to the competition (as many as 10 in one instance) while he simply brought along his trusty Titleist Titanium driver with its 50” shaft.
“I learned a lot, and I’ll know better for next time because theses guys were just so much more advanced [from a technological standpoint],” he noted.