From Tooraneena to PGA Tour glory: Seamus Power is a product of West Waterford roots

Power become just the sixth Irishman to win on the PGA Tour after Darren Clarke, Pádraig Harrington, Graeme McDowell, Rory McIlroy, and Shane Lowry

Seamus Power poses with the Barbasol Championship trophy at Keene Trace Golf Club in Nicholasville, Kentucky. (Photo by Andy Lyons/Getty Images)

All going well, Seamus Power will be back at West Waterford Golf Club at some stage over the next few days and it will be one hell of a party as he celebrates his monumental breakthrough win at the Barbasol Championship in Kentucky on Sunday.

Ten years after he turned professional and nearly five years after he first secured his PGA Tour card via the second tier Korn Ferry Tour and went on to represent Ireland in the Olympic Games, it’s only fitting that he takes the next three weeks off before returning to prepare for the FedEx Cup Playoffs at the wonderful Eddie Hackett creation where he began the game as a 12-year-old with a hurling grip and a thirst to succeed.

He pointed that out clearly to the assembled media at Keene Trace Golf Club in the Lexington suburbs on Sunday night after beating JT Poston at the sixth extra hole of an enthralling playoff to become just the sixth Irishman to win on the PGA Tour after Darren Clarke, Pádraig Harrington, Graeme McDowell, Rory McIlroy, and Shane Lowry.

“Without West Waterford Golf Club, I definitely wouldn't be here,” Power said, keenly aware that the club is desperate to take control of its affairs when the receiver puts it up for sale in an online auction on July 29. 

“I started down there when I was 12, 13 years old. And all of the Spratt family, it was pretty much like my second family, they're incredible.” 

Power might never have taken up golf but for the tragic early death of his mother, Philomena, when he was just eight years old and his brothers, twins Willie and Jack, were only 10.

It was a tough time for his father, Ned, a small farmer in Tooraneena who took a second job working nights at Boston Scientific, where he laser-welded defibrillators and used much of the extra income to support Seamus's travel to junior events all over Ireland.

When Power Snr was working or travelling, he asked close friend and colleague John Walsh and his late wife, Celia, to look after his boys from time to time.

“Ned arrived unexpectedly one day and asked would Celia look after the lad,” John explained.

“‘Well now Seamus,’ she said to him. ‘I am playing golf this afternoon and you are carrying my bag’. And that’s how it started.” 

Winner of three Irish Youths titles - he was second and fourth in his other two participations - Power was an outstanding junior golfer having been nurtured at West Waterford, where people like Justin Spratt, Pat Murphy, and Jimmy Murphy were hugely influential in his development, and course owner Pat Spratt treated him like a son.

Seamus Power poses with the trophy and his caddie Simon Keelan after winning the Barbasol Championship in Nicholasville, Kentucky.

His graduation from the Web.com Tour to the PGA Tour in 2016 was the culmination of a 10-year journey from the amateur ranks and the US collegiate systems at East Tennessee State, and opened the door for him to represent Ireland with Pádraig Harrington in the Rio Olympic Games as he finished a brilliant tied 15th.

"He blew us away in Rio," Ned said during a tribute night for his son at West Waterford following that Olympics. "We hadn't seen him play for a while and we couldn't believe how good he was and a lot of what he has achieved is due to West Waterford.

I can't emphasise enough what West Waterford meant to me when Philo died. Seamus was eight and the twins were 10 and it was tough going. But the club and my great friends John and Celia Walsh were a great help to me.

"He wanted to be there every second. Golf took him over early on. While he was a good racquetball player he told me there was nobody in Ireland to bring him to the next level, so golf took over.

"When he was about to go off to East Tennessee, I took him to Shannon Airport and Cian McNamara, who was a few years older, was there at the airport.

"I was turning away so Seamus wouldn't see me crying as he stood there in the queue and Cian turned to me and said, 'Ned, don't worry, I will look after him'."

Power went on to have a stellar amateur career with ETSU and then learned his trade on the eGolf mini tour in the South Carolina area.

It wasn't easy financially, but funding from the Irish Sports Council helped keep the dream alive and he finally advanced to Q-School's Final Stage in 2014, securing strong status for the 2015 Web.com Tour (now the Korn Ferry Tour) season.

He kept his card with a 67th-place finish on the money list and needed just seven starts in his second season to win the United Leasing & Finance Championship (becoming the first Irish-born player to win on the Web.com Tour).

He finished ninth on the money list to earn his Tour card for the 2016-17 season, retaining it via the Web.com playoffs in year one before making the FedEx Cup Playoffs the following year.

He didn’t make the top 125 in 2019 and has played out of the tenuous 126-150 category for nearly two years before finally earning full status for the next two years with Sunday’s win.

It's a far cry from 20 years ago, when he got his call up for Munster panel coaching in Limerick and was so unfit, he dodged a 3,000-metre run afterwards.

"He was smaller and roundier then and he had physical training with John Glynn and Fred Twomey over in Limerick and they were put through their paces all day," recalls West Waterford stalwart Pat Murphy, who drove him to and from the session.

"He fell asleep somewhere just outside Limerick and but he obviously sensed the Tooraneena air because as we got close to home, he came to and said 'Pat, I'll get off at Beary's Cross.'

You will like hell, I said. I'll drive you home to the door.' But he said, 'No, Dad left the tractor there for me.' And with that, he hopped out, said thanks very much, threw the clubs into the front loader, and off he went.” 

A top student at St Augustine's College in Dungarvan, he graduated from ETSU with an honours degree in accountancy, even though coach Warren feared it would distract him from his golf.

"I said, 'Seamus, are you sure you'll be able to take accounting and play golf?'" Warren said. "He said, 'Yeah.' And he did.” He remains the only golf scholar Warren has seen graduate with a degree in accounting - magna cum laude - in more than 30 years at East Tennessee.

Dungarvan businessman John Power, one of several club members who has helped raise money to back Power on tour, frequently stops in Charlotte to meet the golfer with clients.

"I didn't say it to Seamus at the time so it didn't affect his confidence but when we met in Charlotte with some business partners at the time - they had a turnover of $31 billion with 50 plants around the world - one of them said to me, 'If this man changes his mind about golf, we will make him a senior accountant in our company.'

"That's the calibre of man you are dealing with in Seamus Power and great credit is due to West Waterford where he had great mentors in Pat Murphy, Jimmy Murphy, and the great Justin Spratt.”