Golf Blog

Ten Things From the Pure Insurance Championship

One of the coolest events on the golf calendar is The PURE Insurance Championship Impacting First Tee. Visiting Pebble Beach is already exciting enough, but this golf tournament adds another layer to an already dynamic location. The PGA Tour Champions invites First Tee golfers from around the country to join the tournament and compete alongside the pros. It is a dream come true for 78 aspiring junior golfers. Below you will find my 10 favorite moments from the 2022 edition.

10. Ernie Els birdies holes #6-8 on Sunday charge.

At the PURE Insurance Championship, you get to see a lot of players that you may have missed over the years. Golfers like Ernie Els usually draw a big crowd, but on the Champions Tour, it is easy to get up close and personal.

I joined Ernie on #6 and he made a casual birdie, business as usual for Big Ern. He made a nice putt and gave a slight nod to the gallery. Ernie then came in hot on #7 as you can tell from the Instagram clip below. The real standout in this birdie trio is the difficult 8th hole. Ernie knocked in a downhill slider and the crowd went wild. You could tell that he was pleased with himself.

Ernie hits his second on 6.

Els carries the ocean on his approach to #8.

Ernie made it into the clubhouse early and posted a score of -10. It was unlikely that the score would hold up, but a small group of autograph seeking kids mobbed him like he had just won his 3rd US Open.

Ernie smiles after his birdie turkey.

9. The Match

For the 2nd consecutive year, PURE Insurance has put on a par 3 Team Challenge at Pebble Beach’s short course, The Hay. In 2021, Tiger Woods revisioned Peter Hay’s vision to create a fun place where juniors, families, and friends, could gather around the game of golf. It is the perfect scene for PURE Insurance’s team competition. 

In 2021 it was the highly anticipated match of Team Jacobsen vs Team Sluman. In a drama filled event, Team Sluman pulled off a glorious victory. Somehow the stakes were even higher this year as Team O’Meara took on Team Furyk.

The best part about The Match doesn’t have to do with the competition at all. First Tee participant Isabelle Junio thought she was coming to the event to speak about her experience in the game of golf. What she didn’t realize is that she was going to be announced as a PURE Insurance Scholar. After a brief chat, PURE Insurance CEO, Ross Buchmueller, broke the news to Isabelle.

Mark O Mears puts on a putting clinic for a lucky group of First Tee participants.

It was a glorious moment to witness the surprise on Isabelle’s face when she realized that she was named as a 2022 PURE Insurance Scholar. In addition to being an outstanding young golfer, Isabelle also carries a 4.58 GPA and aspires to be an engineer. You can read more about the scholarship program here.

In the end, Team O’Meara would win the match by a narrow margin, but Isabelle stole the show. Over $500,000 has been pledged in support of PURE Insurance Scholars to date.

These KOW Steaks are next level.

Seamus delivers the swag for The Match

Seamus delivers custom stamped ball marks for all.

Team O’Meara victory shot.

8. Lee Wybranski Makes an Appearance

Lee did more than just make an appearance, he showed up and painted his ass off.  Lee created a total of 3 on site masterpieces at The PURE Insurance Championship, raising over $50k in live and silent auctions.

Rarely does one get to peak behind the scenes and appreciate the process for the creation of art. With 3 Wybranski paintings on the wall in my personal golf den, it was a true pleasure to watch the golf artist at work.

7. The Annual High Kick

It’s not an annual occurence until you do something two years in a row and I was dead set on making this an annual tradition. Last year I got my kicks on the iconic 7th hole. Fortunately, there is more than one location that stirs my high kicking golf soul at Pebble Beach. With plenty of ground to cover on the 18th tee box, I decided to bust out a tuck and roll high kick. It’s a dangerous move and I was sure to stretch properly beforehand.

6. Nikki B Models Hard

As the official PURE Insurance social media host I had my hands full with responsibilities.  However, when the opportunity arose to be the Creative Director on Nikki B’s latest Reels masterpiece, I eagerly accepted the additional role.

Nikki’s poses were just a small part of the #PUREVictoryPose challenge that PURE Insurance hosted all week long. Participants were invited to strike their poses on social media and things got pretty intense with an army of fist pumps and celebratory high kicks.

5. The Kids of The First Tee

The best part about the PURE Insurance Championship Impacting First Tee is the actual First Tee. 78 kids from the ages of 13-17 all across America have earned the opportunity of a lifetime. These juniors get to compete in the action alongside the legends of the game. It is an experience that every participant will remember for a lifetime.

Jeremiah Brown escapes the sand at Spyglass

Even the flags are special at Pebble Beach

First Tee junior, Julia Vollmer guides her ball towards the hole on #9.

Playing with the First Tee Juniors is a responsibility that most of the professionals don’t take lightly. When Ernie was making his Sunday charge, he made sure to give tips to his junior. When Steven Alker was in the lead coming down the final stretch of holes, he was sure to help read his junior’s putts as well as his own. The soul of the Pure Insurance Championship resides with this relationship between the games veterans and its future champions.

Megan Meng wins the First Tee girls division and Braylon Mahanay captures the boys division.

4. Pebble with Paige

7 years ago, I penned a post called Pebble with Paige on the popular Paige Spiranac. This time around, it was time to get to know the other Paige at Pebble Beach. Paige oversees the maintenance crew on the hallowed grounds of Pebble Beach.

When it comes to maintaining such an iconic piece of land it is important to get your nose in the dirt. Paige takes this job quite literally. We caught up with the legendary links doggo as she put the finishing touches on hole 17 and then selected the Sunday pin location on 18.

3. Rob Labritz Gets Revenge

There are a lot of stellar dudes out here on the Champions Tour and one of the best is one of it’s newest members. After winning 2021 Q School, Rob accomplished what many 50-year-olds dream of achieving, he gained full status on the PGA Tour Champions. This was his first full year and he is taking full advantage.

Nobody makes it onto The Champions tour without handling some serious adversity and Rob has certainly seen his share. Labritz was cruising along at -4 on Saturday when he rain into the 2nd hole, his 11th of the day. Normally, this short par 5 is a great birdie opportunity, but somehow an 8 jumped up and bit Labritz in the ass.  Now I would have thrown my golf bag into the ocean, but Rob took it in stride and managed to finish out his last 7 holes of the day in even par.

I like to imagine that the next morning when Rob woke up, he had one thing on his mind… the 2nd hole. Because when it came time to play that par 5 again, he made a freaking eagle. Aside from that little blip, Rob played well all week en route to a respectable T19 finish.

2. 3 days of Sunrises and Sunsets

Monterey is well known for it’s foggy and moody vibes, so it’s always a pleasure when the sun pops out to say hello. My unofficial Monterey weather projections suggest that 1 out of every 3 sunrises and sunsets are cloudy. For the 2022 PURE Championship the Golf weather gods smiled upon us, we got 3 solid days of glorious sunrises and sunsets. Please enjoy the spoils.

The fun in the sun ended on the weekend as a heavy blanket of fog rolled in.

1. The PURE Victory Pose

There was a lot of drama coming down the stretch at this year’s tournament. Steven Alker had held the lead for a good stretch of time on Sunday before an unfortunate bogey on 17 put him in a tie for the lead at -10. The tournament was coming down to the 18th hole.

With Ernie Els already in the clubhouse at -10, it looked like we we could easily be headed for a playoff. Alker, Stankowski, Quigley, and Flesch were all in the mix with a chance to win the golf tournament.

When almost all of the golf shots had settled, it became clear that Steve Flesch had set himself up with an 8 foot birdie putt to win the PURE Insurance Championship. What happened next was PURE Victory Pose magic.

Big smiles were on the faces of everyone involved as the awards were handed on the 18th green. Darkness fell quickly over the 18th green at Pebble Beach but it did little to dampen the spirit of the PURE Insurance Championship.