Zac Blair always ready for the next challenge

ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. -- The question caught Dan Horner by surprise. He’d just picked up his friend at the airport when the passenger asked, “So, where are we playing?”

Horner didn’t think his friend would have any desire to play that day. Maybe later in the week, after he’d rested and unpacked from his work trip. He'd been on the road 15 of the past 17 weeks. But, no, Zac Blair wanted to play right away. Horner and Blair drove from the airport to the course, adding another 18 holes to the countless number they’ve played together.

Blair’s zeal for the game hasn’t weakened since golf transitioned from a passion to a profession. Rest is important in a sport that is played year-round. TOUR players talk about the importance of getting away from the game during the weeks they aren’t competing. Blair, 25, can’t relate.

When he’s home, he’s the ringleader who arranges the tee times and games with friends from Utah’s tight-knit golf community. Blair plays almost daily, often more than 18 holes. Three rounds in one day isn’t unheard of. He also can be seen competing in small tournaments around Utah; he won last year's Sand Hollow Open one week after his season ended at the BMW Championship.

When he’s at a TOUR event, he'll occasionally sneak in a round at a course other than the tournament site. His travels helped him play many of the country’s top courses, including Pine Valley and Cypress Point, last year.

“The kid has a motor,” said Horner, one of Utah’s top amateurs. “His enthusiasm is pretty contagious.

“The most tired I am from playing golf is when he’s back in town during off weeks. I play a lot of golf, and I get to the point where I’m like, ‘I’m done. I can’t go anymore.’ He wants to play the next day and I’m like, ‘I need a break or I’ll hurt myself.’”

Horner traveled to Las Vegas to watch Blair compete at the recent Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. The moon was visible when Blair finished his first round at TPC Summerlin, and an early tee time awaited the next morning. Blair was the one who wanted to go play the lighted par-3 course at nearby Angel Park, though.

Blair’s passion isn’t just for playing, though. He’s also an architecture aficionado who draws his own golf holes and reads books from classic architects like Alister MacKenzie and C.B. MacDonald. Blair aspires to build a course in Utah. He’s helping his father Jimmy, a member of the Utah Golf Hall of Fame, renovate a course in their home state.

“I grew up around (golf) with my dad playing on a bunch of different tours and owning and running golf courses,” said Zac, who finished 59th in last season’s FedExCup as a TOUR rookie. “It’s just something that we did together. I enjoyed it and still enjoy it.”

Zac is 17th in this season's FedExCup after finishing third at last week's Sony Open in Hawaii, a career-best performance that put his bountiful energy in the spotlight. Television cameras captured the ceaseless shuffling of his feet while he stood over shots and his colorful commentary while his ball was airborne.

The Millers (25-time TOUR winner Johnny and his sons) may be the first family associated with Utah golf, but Johnny was born in San Francisco. The Blairs are native sons. Jimmy is an accomplished player and club professional. He was one of six players from the 1976 BYU team to play on the PGA TOUR (1984) and has won both the Utah Amateur and Utah Open.

Jimmy loses count when trying to recall how many state opens he’s won, having earned titles in Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado and North Dakota while traveling in his RV. One newspaper referred to him as “the Butch Cassidy of Western golf.”

Zac was around elementary school age when he’d caddie for his dad.

“I would drive a cart and carry a towel around and act like I was caddying, tell him clubs I thought he should be hitting,” Zac said. “He said he listened to me but who listens to a 6-year-old when you’re playing for money?”

Jimmy also competed on the PGA TOUR and Web.com Tour (his best finish, a T6 at the 1990 Amarillo Open, came three weeks after Zac was born) and has played in six PGA Championships. Zac met Tiger Woods while Jimmy was playing the 2000 PGA at Valhalla, then played with Woods at last year’s Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide.

Jimmy is the director of golf at two courses in Southern Utah, and has had a hand in owning, managing and renovating courses throughout the state. “He’s pretty knowledgeable in the whole realm of golf,” Zac said.

Jimmy's work meant his son always lived on a golf course. Jimmy designed and owned Mulligans Golf & Games, an executive course in Ogden, and Zac took full advantage of his father's creation.

Zac would hit buckets of range balls on the two easiest holes after the course had cleared. “He wanted to make a hole-in-one so bad,” Jimmy said. “He thought it would be a hole-in-one if he made it.”

As Zac and his friends got older, their putting contests would drag late into the night on the lighted putting green. “Hundreds of times we’d get, ‘When are you going to turn the lights out?’ because they’d be out putting at 12 or 1 in the morning. We were supposed to have the lights out by 11:30,” Jimmy said.

Then there are the marathon days of golf. Zac is usually the one to call for an E9, or emergency nine, to extend the day's play. He hasn’t slowed much, even though his 34 starts were the second-most in the 2014-15 season. He also squeezed in recreational rounds at Pine Valley, Cypress Point, The Country Club of Brookline and Los Angeles Country Club during tournament weeks in 2015. That's a list that would make even the most privileged player envious.

Like his father, Zac wants to do more than play, though.

He's looking for land in Utah on which to build his dream course, a layout that will draw off the design principles of architecture’s golden age. He wants to build a course that's wide enough for high handicappers while challenging better players to make strategic decisions.

“I think Utah deserves a course that has those principles of the old architects,” Zac said, citing Mackenzie, MacDonald, Seth Raynor and Harry Colt as his inspirations. “You have to think your way around those courses.”

“The Buck Club,” the name of Zac’s potential course, already has a Twitter handle (@thebuckclub) and logo, which Blair sports on hats and his staff bag.

“Even when I was really little I told my parents I was going to be an architect and go to school for architecture,” Zac said. “I always loved art classes in school.”

That explains his unique pastime: Legos. He was re-introduced to the toys at the 2013 U.S. Amateur because the children of his host family had a collection. He visited LEGOLAND during last year’s Farmers Insurance Open.

“I'd stopped playing with them in third or fourth grade, when most normal people stop playing with them,” Zac joked.

The toys are now a source of relaxation for a player whose intensity is obscured by his smile.

Zac shares his father's slight build. He's listed at 5-foot-6, 155 pounds in the media guide. His driving distance average of 278.8 yards per tee shot ranks 190th on TOUR. He uses a strong short game -- he ranks 18th in scrambling -- to stay in the game. Horner recalls a casual round when Zac faced three 50-yard shots in a 10-hole stretch.

"The first one hit the pin and stopped on the edge. He holed the next two," Horner said.

"There are certain intangibles you can’t really measure. His heart and his determination and his confidence are things you can’t really teach."

A qualifier for the 2010 U.S. Amateur serves as a strong example. Zac thought he had a chance to advance to the event at Chambers Bay if he played his final five holes in 6 under. “(My dad) looked at me, like, ‘Yeah, right,’” Zac recalled. Sure enough, he did it.

“My whole life, I’ve always been able to get it done when it really mattered,” Zac said. “I don’t know if that’s something my parents have instilled in me or something you have. I’ve always been extremely confident, even when things aren’t going the best.”

That was nothing like his path to the PGA TOUR. Blair attended the final stage of the 2013 Web.com Tour Q-School as an amateur. He was expecting to play amateur golf the following year after a poor showing left him with very limited Web.com Tour status. He was checking scores in PGA TOUR Latinoamerica’s opener when he saw people in the field whom he’d beaten at Q-School. Turns out he had enough status to get in Latinoamerica’s early events, so he turned pro while completing his recreation management degree at BYU. When he arrived in Mexico for his pro debut, he and two other players decided to share a cab to the course. The driver tied their clubs to the roof with rope.

He got into his first Web.com Tour event in July and, in just eight starts, played well enough to qualify for the Web.com Tour Finals. He missed the first three cuts, but when a friend tried to offer consolation by reminding Zac he had Web.com Tour status for the following season, Zac replied, “I’m still getting my PGA TOUR card.” He finished second at the Web.com Tour Championship to do that.

“My dad used to tell me that the guy who is really good is the guy who is excited to hit a shot,” said BYU director of golf Todd Miller, the son of Johnny Miller. “Sometimes you want someone else to hit first or you’re not excited to hit it. I’ve never seen him that way. He’s always excited about the next shot and the challenge.”