Golfing across kentucky for cancer research

In Loving Memory of Gene Wright

My father passed away on April 7th, 2007 after a five year battle with cancer. Dad was originally diagnosed in 2002 with stage 4 cancer. The Oncologists at Vanderbilt said he most likely had a year or less to live due to the advanced stage of his cancer.  He was actually able to live for nearly five more years due to experimental or trial medicines. Our family made the most of those extra years with dad. He was able to continue to work some in his profession as a barber and an elected official in our home county. More importantly he was able to spend quality time with our family. With the added years he was blessed to watch his grandsons grow up. He was even able to see them play together on our local high school basketball team. Just a month before he passed he had the blessing of seeing them both start varsity as they won the district championship. It was the last game he would ever see.

After my dad passed not a day went by that I didn’t think about him and the impact he had on my life and our community. In 2012 I decided I wanted to honor him by joining the fight against the dreaded disease of cancer. It was then that I established GOLFING KENTUCKY FOR A CURE. I thought it would be the perfect opportunity to combine two of my most fervent passions, golf and defeating cancer.

The first few years different players filled our foursome as we began our quest. One of the most dedicated to the cause was Trigg County legend Jerry Faris. He played in nearly every cancer tour round. Then tragically Jerry passed away from cancer. At that time we suspended the project but now we are back more committed than ever to see it to the finish line.

We have a committed regular foursome consisting of Mike McGill, Al Starnes, Shawn Williamson and myself. I might add that the passion for donating money for cancer research is not mine alone in our golf foursome. Shawn lost his wife to cancer at age 39. Mike and Al are cancer survivors themselves.

The idea is simple. Let me explain how GOLFING KENTUCKY FOR A CURE WORKS. I and the rest of my golf foursome plan to be the first group ever to play EVERY golf course in the state of Kentucky and raise or donate as much money possible for cancer research while doing so. The following procedures are how we make it happen.

1. I have researched and have a list of every golf course in the state of Kentucky. This includes public and private as well as eighteen and nine hole courses.
2. I have contact information for each course.
3. I have set up a GOLFING KENTUCKY FOR A CURE account at FNB Bank in our hometown of Cadiz Kentucky. Local citizens and members of our Relay for Life Organization are signed on to monitor the account.
4. I call each course and ask permission to play. We then donate the total costs of the four green fees and cost of the carts to the GOLFING KENTUCKY FOR A CURE FUND.
5. After the round we take a picture of our foursome at each course.
6. Following the golf outing we go to a LOCAL restaurant to eat. It has to be local, no chains allowed.
7. The last step of the process is communicating about our project. The first few years of the tour I would return home and write a column for the local newspaper, The Cadiz Record. I would tell of our adventures. I discontinued the columns and am currently providing the same information via this website.
8. Upon completion of the tour, all funds will be transferred from FNB Bank to Trigg County Relay for Life to be used in the fight against cancer.

When I started this project someone told me, “Coach (I am a retired high school basketball coach), you can’t play every golf course in the state.” I replied, “Well I can’t do it next week but I can over a period of years.”  And so the journey began.

Message from Mike Wright