First-Timer Sim Ready to Wave Australian Flag [Golf Ping: The Masters]

Growing up, Michael Sim was a typical Australian child of the 1980s and ’90s, especially when it came to golf. He idolized Greg Norman – as a junior, he wore a broad-brimmed white hat similar to his hero’s – and the first week of each April, he would rise at 3 a.m. local time to see the Masters on television.

He was not, of course, the only one. Practically his entire adopted homeland – Sim was born in Aberdeen, Scotland, but his family moved to Australia when Michael was 5 – then as now routinely set its alarm clocks to view the final round from Augusta.

“Every Australian watches,” says the reigning Nationwide Tour Player of the Year and one of 17 first-time Masters invitees.

“Everyone talked about the Masters, about what Greg did,” he continues. “For that tournament, I used to get up early even on school days. You’d see the final round on Monday morning in Australia; I’d even miss the first couple of classes to see it.”

Perhaps luckily, his memories from 1996 Masters, Norman’s infamous final-round letdown versus three-time champion Nick Faldo, are not vivid. “(Norman) had what, a six-shot lead?” he says. Of course, Sim, 25, was only 11 at the time.

But he can describe in intimate detail the Augusta National Golf Club’s fabled course as if he had played it dozens of times, instead of only in his Great White Shark-tinged dreams.

“I’ve never actually been to Augusta, but I feel like I have been,” he says. “I’ve seen so many shots, especially on the back nine. Watching on TV, I feel like I’ve played the course in a way.

“When I get there, it’s not like I’ll stand on the 10th tee and say, ‘Where does this go?’ You know where to hit it, where to miss, where to come into the green (from) – just from watching on TV.”

He’ll get there one month from now, joining fellow Australians Nathan Green, Marc Leishman and players from Japan, England, Korea and Italy, plus seven Americans, as Masters’ rookies. Few of the rest have traveled as twisting a route to Magnolia Lane.

“Yeah,” Sim says, laughing. “If you’d asked me a year ago, (with him having) conditional status on the Nationwide Tour, ‘Do you think you’ll be in the Masters?’ There probably wasn’t much chance.”

Such hardly seemed likely when Sim was the world’s top-ranked amateur in 2005, a young star with seemingly unlimited potential. He turned professional later that year at age 21, and after a season on the Nationwide Tour, where he won once and finished 19th on the 2006 money list, he was off to the PGA Tour.

Except he wasn’t, not right away. Unknowingly, Sim suffered a stress fracture to his spine during a Nationwide event in Wichita. “I hit my tee shot and felt something down in my back,” he says. “I had an MRI in Pittsburgh and it was all clear, so I went home, rehabbed for a month and came back. Then, two events later, it went out again.”

By the time he was diagnosed and treated, the 2007 PGA Tour season was done and Sim ranked 169th. He failed to win enough money for full exemption during a five-event medical extension in 2008, and returned to the Nationwide Tour last spring.

He did so with a vengeance. In 12 starts, he won three times to earn a “battlefield promotion” and a tour-record $644,142. He also demonstrated PGA Tour-level savvy, tying for 18th at the U.S. Open while playing with Tiger Woods in the final round. A sixth-place finish at the Australian Open and a tie for fifth at the Australian PGA vaulted Sim to 44th in the Official World Golf Rankings – and earned him his Masters debut.

“It’s a big, big deal,” he says. “Growing up, I always wanted to play it, and now I’m lucky enough to be there. It probably won’t sink in until I get there, when I step on the grounds.

“I want to get down there after Doral (CA Championship) or Tampa (Transitions Championship) to have a look at the place. If I go early, I can know my way around, and it can become more of a normal event.”

But Sim readily admits the Masters is not that. “It’s the best tournament in the world,” he says unashamedly. He knows the rest of his countrymen feel that way, too.

“Obviously, Aussies have won every other major but that one,” he says. “I don’t know exactly why it’s so special, but that’s a good reason. (Geoff) Ogilvy won the (U.S.) Open, Greg won the British twice and Elk (Steve Elkington) won the PGA.

“No Aussie’s won (the Masters), and it gets talked about a lot in Australia that we’ve never won.”

No question, an Australian will win a Green Jacket eventually, Sim says. Equally not in doubt, he would love to be the one to end the drought.

“To me, the first to do anything, it’s a great achievement,” he says. “Whoever the first winner is will be a great champion, a hall of famer when he goes home to Australia.”

As a Masters rookie, Sim won’t discount the possibility of winning, even if this hasn’t happened since Fuzzy Zoeller’s win in 1979. “I’m in the field, so I have a chance.” As a second choice, he’d settle for, say, a top-16 finish and automatic return invitation. “That’s pretty realistic,” he says. “I was 18th at Bethpage last year, and three wins on the Nationwide Tour will help me do my best.”

For now, he’s content to visualize other “firsts” – his opening tee shot, his first venture through Amen Corner – and anticipate sharing those experiences with his coach of 13 years, David Milne, family members and other long-time supporters.

It is, he said, the achievement of a lifetime – even if that’s only 25 years, just five as a professional golfer.

“I don’t feel 25,” he said. “It’s moving along fast.”

Come the first week in April, Sim probably won’t feel 25, either. Chances are he’ll feel like a kid again

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