Weyburn’s Rick Hallberg entered the 2018 golf season with a list of goals and the Golf Kenosee player accomplished what he set out to do.
Hallberg is fresh of a 22nd place finish at the Canadian Men’s Senior Championship in New Brunswick, plus he is the Saskatchewan senior men’s Order of Merit (OMT) champion for 2018. Hallberg said the OMT win is a nice touch to end a strong season.
“It’s nice to win that yeah, that was a goal of mine was to finish well in the OMT and make the senior team and get to nationals,” Hallberg said.
During the national championship Hallberg was as high as fifth on the leaderboard but dropped down to the 22nd spot at the end of the event in Bathurst. One hole cost Hallberg several positions on the leaderboard but he was still happy with his placing. He said overall, he feels he can play with the best seniors in Canada.
“Once I got going out there I was playing well and sticking right with those guys. It gives a guy hope for next year that if I go out there and get it going I could win it,” he said.
Hallberg won the Saskatchewan tour with 2,550 points, 450 more than Golf Kenosee counterpart Paul Grimes. Hallberg gathered 600 points for a second-place finish at the Auto Clearing Senior Men’s Championship, he placed seventh at the Senior Publinx which earned him 200 points. He won the Mercator Financial South West Senior Men’s Championship which was worth 750 points and he picked up 1,000 points for winning the Saskatchewan Senior Men’s Championship on his home course in Kenosee.
After taking a couple years off competitive golf Hallberg said he will look to build off this season and try to improve on his results.
“I definitely want to play lots next summer too and get back to the senior nationals and maybe even take a crack at the mid-amateur nationals next year. I passed up going to the mid-am this year to caddy in the CP Women’s Open but that was another awesome experience,” he said.
You can see the complete OMT standings for the senior men here.