Sido beats them all, wins Gold by shooting -40 his age, a 61 at 101 in first day of Senior Olympics

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Bill Motchan, Special to the Jewish Light

Bob Sido was one of the first athletes to win a medal in the 2022 St. Louis Senior Olympics. He won the 9-hole golf competition on May 27 in the 100-year-old and over-age group.

Sido, who is 101 years old, shot a 61 at Creve Coeur Golf Course, easily beating a milestone all golfers strive for. In golf, an “age shooter” is a player whose score matches or beats his or her age. On the PGA tour, the record belongs to Sam Snead who shot a 67 at the Quad Cities Open in 1979, when he was 67 years old.

Actually, Sido said he’s shot his exact age a few times between the age of 70 and 90. For years he was a 9-handicap and he usually did well at the par-71 Glen Echo Country Club. Decades earlier, Sido’s mother was the club champion at the same course.

 

On a cold, damp morning in Creve Coeur for the Senior Olympics, Sido used a driver on the No. 1 hole (a tough 226-yard par 4 with a sloping fairway). His ball landed 170 yards ahead in the center of the fairway. He was on the green in three shots and two-putted for a bogey.

The first time Sido picked up a golf club was when he was 5 years old. That would be about 1926, when Calvin Coolidge was president. A gallon of milk cost 28 cents and the number one hit song was “Bye Bye, Blackbird.”

“The clubs had hickory shafts,” he said. “I learned an important lesson when I was about 12 years old. I used to be able to hit over a road and one time I didn’t. So I hit the ground with the club. It had a wooden shaft, so it split in two pieces. Back home in the garage, my dad said to me ‘Don’t you ever do that again!”

To prepare for his Senior Olympics round this year, Sido did a little stretching and continued his regular daily fitness regimen.

“I try to walk a mile every day if I can,” he said. “I should do more. I walk 10 laps around in my condo building, which I know is exactly one mile. I think it is important to get exercise.”