Friday, April 17, 1998 | 8:25 a.m.
By most accounts, Jim Colbert completed a remarkable comeback last summer when he competed in the Kaanapali Classic in Hawaii less than four months after undergoing prostate cancer surgery.
By his own account, Colbert's comeback won't be complete until he wins again.
Colbert, the longtime Las Vegas resident and two-time Senior PGA Tour Player of the Year, has not let his battle with cancer diminish his desire to be the best. If anything, it has intensified his desire to win a 19th Senior Tour title.
"The desire is still there -- probably more so," Colbert said this week as he prepared for the PGA Seniors Championship in Florida and next week's Las Vegas Senior Classic. "It's important to me, personally, (to win again) because I try like crazy to do it and I'm highly motivated.
"I don't feel like I have anything to prove to the interested public but I feel like I have things to prove to myself. I don't know why, I just do.
"One of the unique things about being a professional golfer and one of the unique things in our makeup is it's very, very difficult to win a golf tournament. But we seem to just have to keep measuring up, day after day, week after week -- to ourselves."
Colbert, who turned 57 last month, said he feels his time is running out to rejoin the winner's circle -- but not through any morbid sense of mortality as a result of his brush with cancer.
"There is, I guess for the lack of a better term, a certain amount of urgency," Colbert said of winning again. "Any time you put a time frame on anything, it puts you in a sense of urgency. When you start on the regular circuit at age 24, time is zero factor. But when you start the Senior circuit at age 50, the clock starts the day you start.
"You guys (in the media) write about it, everybody talks about it, everybody says the 50 year olds have got the advantage and that clock ticks from the day you tee up when you're 50. Does it add pressure? Of course. Does it add stress? Of course. Is it a motivator? Of course, because when you add time into any equation ... you're feeling pressure."
"Time adds pressure" Colbert added, "and the Senior Tour is a time bomb."
A time bomb that Colbert hopes he can diffuse, however temporarily, by regaining the form that led him to 18 Senior PGA Tour titles and more than $8 million in earnings since he joined the circuit full time in 1991.
Physically, Colbert said he is as strong -- if not stronger -- than he was before he was diagnosed last June with prostate cancer. But he admits his stamina is not back to where it was before the surgery.
"When I did play at the end of last year, I knew I really needed to work on my endurance because I had lost a lot of it from the layoff and from the surgery," he said. "I also realized how good the other guys were playing.
"If I get (my game) back to the exact same level that I was before, that would be pretty good. But it won't play at the absolute top level out here -- they're playing better than that. I need to actually be better than I was."
Colbert said he feels stronger than he has in years.
"Even though my strength came right back after the surgery, my endurance wasn't worth a darn," he said. "So I've really worked on the aerobic part of it for endurance. I really feel kind of better and stronger than I ever had on the Senior circuit. Now I've just got to turn it into some outstanding golf."
Mentally, Colbert said, he has the same burning desire to compete -- and win -- as he did before his June 23 surgery.
"I kind of want to do it more than ever, while I still have the physical capabilities to compete at a high level," Colbert said. "I don't see any reason, physically or mentally, why I can't do this. Now, whether I do it or not or whether I'm kidding myself, that remains to be seen.
"I personally really don't see any limitations on me, physically or mentally, at this stage. But you still have to go out there and play and you have to play really good because the level (of competition) goes up every year."
Going into this weekend's Senior Championship, Colbert has played in seven official Senior Tour events and stands 15th on the money list with $182,842. He has two top-10 finishes -- a fourth-place tie at the LG Championship in February and a sixth-place showing last month in the Southwestern Bell Dominion.
Colbert most recently tied for 11th at The Tradition, his putter being the only difference between his finish and another top-10 effort.
"I've played pretty well in the last month," Colbert said. "Actually, I've played real well but I have putted kind of poorly.
"Physically, I've played really well. As a matter of fact, I've played three rounds in the last month as good as I can play but I shot two 70s and a 69 so I obviously didn't do anything with it on the greens."
Next week's Las Vegas Senior Classic is one tournament Colbert said he looks forward to playing all year. After winning the event in 1995 and 1996 when it was played at the Tournament Players Club at Summerlin, Colbert said he is optimistic about returning to familiar surroundings.
Last year, the Senior Classic was moved to the new TPC at The Canyons. This year, the tournament will utilize both TPC courses on Thursday and Friday, with the final two rounds played exclusively at the TPC at Summerlin.
"I'm looking forward to going back to Summerlin and the TPC," Colbert, who tied for 11th last year, said. "It's not a secret that I prefer that golf course because I've had a lot of success there and I've played it a lot.
"I think it's a great situation to be playing both golf courses this year, playing for four days and having the weekend totally at Summerlin -- I think it's good for everybody."
archive
