Glens Falls freshman Brayden Dock, shown after a recent junior golf tournament in Florida.
Brayden Dock will get a much closer look at the start of Masters week than most anyone his age.
Dock, a 14-year-old freshman at Glens Falls High School, qualified in the fall of 2019 for the national finals of Drive, Chip & Putt, a golf skills competition open to 7-15 year-olds. The finals are held at Augusta National Golf Club on Easter Sunday, April 4.
“When I qualified, I was stoked. I was really shocked, too,” Dock said. “I would love to play really well, but it’s just cool to be going down there and see some of the players and the course.”
Because of the coronavirus pandemic, last year’s Drive, Chip & Putt championships and qualifying for this year were canceled and the Masters was moved to November.
However, qualifying from 2019 was carried over to this spring, so Dock is still competing with the qualifiers in the 12-13 age group on the eve of Masters week.
“They compete the day before the first practice round for the Masters,” said Jeff Dock, Brayden’s father, the social studies department head and Alpine ski coach at Glens Falls High School. “He loves the sport, it’s just what he wants to do. He’s very driven to go out, work hard at it and have fun.”
Brayden Dock has grown up at the Hiland Park Country Club in Queensbury. In his finalist bio on the Drive, Chip & Putt website, Dock said his father — a passionate golfer — pushed him around the course in a jogging stroller when he was “less than a year old.”