Break benefits Brown

Mark Brown’s decision five years ago to take a break from golf paid handsome dividends when the New Zealander claimed his second victory in as many weeks with a three-shot win at the Johnnie Walker Classic.

Brown came from four strokes down to overhaul Japan’s Taichiro Kiyota at the DLF Golf and Country Club near Delhi yesterday for the biggest win of his career in an event tri-sanctioned by the European Tour, Asian Tour and PGA Tour of Australasia.

The victory came just a week after his maiden Asian Tour win at the SAIL Open and has opened a number of doors for the Wellington native, who now has full exemptions on all three sanctioning tours for the next couple of years.

It is a remarkable turn of fortunes for the 33-year-old, who decided to quit the game in 2003.

“I played for eight or nine years on the Australasian Tour and Canadian Tour, one year in Asia, but I really wasn’t good enough,” said Brown.

“I was at the age where mentally I wasn’t there and my short game wasn’t good enough.

“In every respect, I really wasn’t good enough.”

According to Brown, there were other factors at work that convinced him to hang up his clubs.

“I thought, ’let’s take a break from it and take stock.’

“At the time, my father was sick, so I thought it was probably a good time to stay home and get a job. I bought a house with my partner at the time and we did that up and sold it.

“The three years away were actually quite a good learning curve. I really did nothing golf-wise apart from coaching. I didn’t play very much myself.”

It was Brown’s coach who eventually convinced him to return to the game early last year.

“My coach back home, Mal Tongue, was always in my ear that I was good enough to make it,” Brown explained.

“I didn’t quite have the same belief but I came back to it and we worked hard and, last year, playing on the Asian Tour was huge for me because I played well, got my confidence up and realised that maybe I can compete.”

Brown also felt he owed something to his father – to return to the game.

He said: “He was always so supportive of my golf in a quiet sort of way.

“He didn’t come and watch me play but when I told him that I was going to give it up, you could tell he was pretty disappointed because he always believed in me and believed that if you tried long and hard enough, you’ll succeed.