Golf: Injury has Nobilo looking at options

By MARTIN DAVIDSON

Frank Nobilo is not quite ready to read his golfing obituary, but injury has forced him to consider getting off the competitive treadmill.

Nobilo has not hit a ball since he missed the second-round cut at the New Zealand Open in January and, after six months of intensive treatment for a painful lower-back injury, there is nothing to suggest he will get back on to the US PGA Tour any time soon.

The Aucklander, who has won 14 titles around the world, had expected by now to be able to name his comeback date after jumping off the PGA treadmill last October to nurse his back.

"All things aside, I function normally but golf is a distant possibility and right now it's not a reality," Nobilo said yesterday from his Florida home.

"I thought by March I would be in better condition. My rehabilitation is going along not too bad, but my limit at the end of the day may be everything apart from professional golf.

"When it affects your golf swing, when you flinch on shots or can't complete your backswing and follow through, you are not able to play.

"It doesn't mean that I have written it off.

"I'm still hopeful, but at the moment I can enjoy my life only when I'm not playing because that puts undue pressure on my back.

"Hopefully it's still healing, but you have to be realistic and say you don't heal as well in your 40s as you did in your 20s or 30s."

Nobilo, 42, and this country's leading player until Michael Campbell overtook him in the late 1990s, is looking at his options, although they are limited because golf is all he's known since he turned pro in 1979.

"There's no way I want to sit at home and do origami or anything like that," he said.

The corporate golf circuit is one possibility, where players and former players play with corporate guests before entertaining them at functions.

Some players, certainly those with instant name recognition, can earn up to US$40,000 doing this.

"You can play a couple of times a week. It would keep me involved in the game, but it's not competitive golf and I'm not sure how I'd put up with that," Nobilo said.

There is a chance he has a future in television.

He filled in as a guest analyst for the first time on the Golf Channel (US and Canada audience: 55 million) this week, and it is something he would like to develop.

Course design is a possibility, but Nobilo said he would need to do a lot of homework first.

South African world No 2 Ernie Els, one of Nobilo's closest friends on the PGA Tour, would like to see him back out on the fairways.

"Ernie was back here a couple of weeks ago," Nobilo said.

"He's a good friend and he wants me to get out and play, but it's even hard for him to talk about it.

"Nothing lasts forever but sometimes we live in a dream world and think it's going to go on and on."

- NZPA