Michael Long lost a year of golf when he broke his neck. Needless to say, it could have been worse

[Max]

Michael Long lost a year of golf when he broke his neck. Needless to say, it could have been worse

Jeremy Sandler
National Post


Friday, July 04, 2003
ADVERTISEMENT


RICHMOND HILL, Ont. - Michael Long walked off the 18th hole after the first round of the Canadian PGA Championship unhappy with his two-over par 73, but happy to be walking at all.

The 34-year-old New Zealander is less than four years removed from breaking his neck in a boogie boarding accident near his Perth, Australia home.

"The waves weren't very big," he said yesterday, recalling Dec. 28, 1999 when he was almost paralyzed. "I tried to go out through a wave, just break through it, and I just got somersaulted up the wave and over and came straight down on my head. A bit like in a cartoon where you see the guys go straight down into the sand. That's exactly what I did."

Slammed by the surf into the turf, Long instantly knew something was wrong, though he did not know the extent to which he was injured.

"I had immediate pain straight across my shoulder and a splitting headache and that was sort of it, it was just sort of like the wind knocked out of me.

With the cool water soothing him somewhat, Long stayed in the water for about 30 minutes attempting to make the pain go away with different stretches of his arms and shoulders.

"The one move I didn't do was pull my head forward and push the vertebrae back to cut the [spinal] cord, so I was just dead lucky," he said. "It was close. I mean one nanometre of force and of course that would have been a totally different story.

Shooting pains down his arms sent him to the hospital, but Long still did not think anything was seriously wrong.

"It wasn't until the guy came back an hour-and-a-half later, that's when he told me I broke my neck, and promptly walked off, it was quite amazing," Long said. "When the doctor told me, I just wanted to move every little finger and every little toe, make sure that everything was working."

Carrey Ewing, Long's girlfriend of 10 years who has also served as his caddy for three wins over the last three months, had a slightly different view of how things went at the hospital in Perth.

"Michael went as white as a sheet when he found out," she recalled with a smile yesterday after carrying his bag during round one of the CPGA.

While the physical injury healed in three months, Long estimates it knocked off his golf preparations by about a year. Even more difficult than healing the bones was dealing with the mental aspect of coming so close to losing both his mobility and livelihood.

"The hardest thing to deal with was getting away with something so life changing and trying to sort it out in your head and categorize it," he said. "It took quite a while for me just to settle down and start enjoying things."

But in 2000, the year following his accident, he managed to make the cut in 14 of 25 Nationwide Tour events. In 2001, Long earned his PGA Tour card for 2002 by finishing 15th on the Nationwide Tour's money list.

He finished No. 183 on the 2002 PGA money list with US$157,723, putting him back on the Nationwide Tour this year, but at No. 9 on the money list with US$105,761 in winnings heading into the CPGA Championship, Long could be back on the PGA Tour next year.

"It's such a long way to go, you don't really think about those things," he said of when asked about his goals for the rest of this season.

In the meantime, he's working with the Australian Spine Research Trust, trying to do fundraising when he can, believing a breakthrough in spinal research is close at hand.

He's also no longer boogie boarding.

"I hardly did it beforehand," he said. " But no, I haven't been back on a boogie board since."

jsandler@ationalpost.com

© Copyright 2003 National Post



http://www.canada.com/ottawa/sports/...8-A6237D82EBDF