Johnson And McKnight's Perseverance Pays Off

By Ken Klavon

Hutchinson, Kan. – Beer Man and Gas Guy will compete this week at the U.S. Senior Open at Prairie Dunes Country Club.

No, they aren't some kind of hybrid super heroes. They are two every-day guys who are living a dream most never get to experience.

Fifty-two-year-old Mark Johnson and Tom McKnight, 51, are intrinsically linked in more ways than one. Both spent considerable time working jobs as distributors – Johnson delivering beer; McKnight gasoline fuel – before embarking on new career paths that perhaps were guided by providence. How else does one explain their Champions Tour Qualifying School success in which they finished one-two in the fall of 2004?

Johnson, who has developed a cult following and is affectionately called "Beer Man" everywhere he

Johnson (Courtesy Champions Tour)

competes, drove a truck for a distributor H.R. Olson for 18 years in Barstow, Calif. He's attracted a following through his own Web site, www.beermangolf.com that his girlfriend Deborah Stelleer developed. He's identifiable with all the beer logos he has on his bag and clothing. Even the back of his hat declares "Beer Man" in stitched lettering.

He enjoys the attention so much – and not in the media hound sense - that last year in an event in Birmingham, Ala., he participated in a TV schtick, driving a beer rig to the course and unloading his clubs from the cargo area that holds the beverage.

 "He's a definite asset out here," tour veteran Dave Stockton told the Houston Chronicle. "His fresh attitude, he appreciates everything."

"He's just a genuine person," said McKnight on Tuesday. "He appreciates where he came from."

That much is true. On Tuesday, after practicing at Prairie Dunes, he cited fellow distributor brethren on the Fourth of July holiday weekend, saying that this is a brutal time of the year for them. He knows all too well.

Johnson once had a delivery route that would sometimes encompass 300 miles round trip through the Mojave Desert. It wasn't uncommon for his days to start at 3 a.m. and end at 7 p.m. for a vocation that capped out at $35,000 a year. He was a driver-sale distributor, meaning that he'd lug 600-1,000 cases around, drop them off, take inventory and rotate product.

"It was very hard work. Very physical and you had to work your butt off," said Johnson.

While working, he maintained his love for the game, playing in as many amateur events as he could. He won Southern California Golf Association Mid-Amateur events, and the 1996 California State Amateur at Pebble Beach. Up to that point in his career, his claim to fame was losing to a young hotshot by the name of Tiger Woods in the 1994 SCGA Amateur. All Woods did was fire a course-record 62 at Hacienda Golf Club in La Habra Heights. Johnson often sacrificed vacation time to play, but was also fortunate to have an understanding employer.

"For distributing, busy season is in the summer and all the tournaments are in the summer," said Johnson, who has missed the cut in the last two Senior Opens.

As Johnson matured, he thought that maybe one day he might have the game to qualify for the Champions Tour. It was at age 45 that he started what he referred to as "the process." H.R. Olson and five other financiers decided to sponsor him for five years while he went off to compete on the Golden State Tour, Nationwide Tour and then on the Canadian Tour for four years. Johnson said he just re-upped for another five years.

In the fall of 2004 he attended Champions Tour Qualifying School. It was there that he registered six consecutive sub-par rounds, including a final-round 64, to finish as the medalist.

"The thing is, you have to have the breaks at the right time," said Johnson. "At Q-School I played the best golf of my career at the right time.

"This is absolutely a dream to be doing what I'm doing. There are a lot of players chasing the dream and they never get the chance [to fulfill it]."

Another "break" had to do with meeting McKnight, a reinstated amateur who decided to give the Champions Tour a shot. McKnight owned a petroleum distributorship business for 20 years in Virginia, among a chain of convenience stores, after a doctor told him that an injury he suffered would alter his golf swing.

But McKnight never let the dream die. He took a similar path as defending champion Allen Doyle, supporting his family and pursuing a pro career after his kids grew up.

McKnight had sold his gas distributor company in 1999 just as he came off a runner-up showing in the 1998 U.S. Amateur, losing to Hank Kuehne. That earned him a place on the '99 USA Walker Cup squad, but maybe more importantly, refueled his competitive juices.

"I was ready to do something different," said McKnight. "The kids were at the right age where I could do something different, and the timing was good."

In 2001, at 46, he joined the Hooters Tour with all the young guns. The experience was invaluable, he said, teaching him that he could never rest on his laurels. The competition was so fierce that if someone carded five birdies in a round, invariably someone would go lower. But he enjoyed it.

"They were all kids in their mid-20s," said McKnight. "They'd all call me grandpa out there."

It didn't bother him.

"To be able to play golf for a living after what I did," said McKnight, "this sure beats that."

Not knowing Mark Johnson from Magic Johnson, McKnight took solace in meeting someone like him at Q-School, where he shot 23 under par and carded a 9-under 63 on the final day.

Stockton, the 1996 Senior Open champion, has taken each competitor under his wing, offering playing tips and always including them in his practice-round regimen.

It might be argued – at least in Johnson's case – that Stockton has helped. Last year Johnson won the Toshiba Senior Classic in his home territory (Orange County, Calif.) for his first Champions Tour victory, when he holed an 89-yard lob wedge at the final hole. The $247,500 first-place check was almost half of the $650,785 he earned on the tour last season, which placed him 28th on the money list to give him full-exemption status for 2006.

McKnight (Courtesy Champions Tour)

McKnight, who played in the 1999 U.S. Open at Pinehurst, hasn't been as fortunate. He placed 31st, which was one spot out of the top 30 required to maintain the full-exemption privilege. With partial exempt status, he's been able to play in every event he's wanted to in 2006, with his best finish coming at the Regions Charity Classic (fifth). It makes the pursuit of full-time status more difficult because, as giddy as he is to be playing, the quest falls on the slippery side of slope.

"It's very different," said McKnight, comparing working to playing now. "It's a very different kind of pressure; a totally different perspective. For someone like [Johnson and myself], we have to prove ourselves every day, every tournament just to try and keep status."

"I knew it wasn't going to be easy," said Johnson.

Still, neither would trade this for anything.

"Being a truck driver is a grind. I don't ever want to go back to doing that," said Johnson. "This is a chance of a lifetime."

Sometimes dreams do come true.

Ken Klavon is the USGA Web Editor. E-mail him with questions or comments to kklavon@usga.org.