I've been looking forward to it for the last four years. As a referee I got frustrated sitting on my buggy watching the guys go round as I wanted to be out there too playing with them.
Roger Chapman is hoping his first win on the European Seniors Tour arrives somewhat more rapidly than his icebreaker on its younger sibling.
And with good reason. Should Chapman, as he did on the European Tour, have to wait 29 years to break his duck as a senior, he will be pushing 80!
That win in the 2000 Brazil Rio de Janeiro 500 Years Open came in Chapman's 472nd tournament but, on the evidence of the Kenyan-born Englishman's form in his first two senior outings, such a lengthy quest seems unlikely.
He finished third when he made his debut in the Son Gual Mallorca Senior Open in May and was joint-third at the end of the Irish Seniors Open earlier this month.
Coincidentally, Chapman went into both final rounds leading by two strokes but was overhauled by Mark James in Mallorca and Ian Woosnam at Ballybunion. Had Chapman held on to his lead in the former, however, he would have become the youngest winner in Senior Tour history, beating John Bland's record of 50 years and nine days set at the London Masters in 1995.
Without wanting to wish his life away, Chapman, who stopped playing on the European Tour in 2005, had become increasingly impatient waiting to the moment he could join the Seniors Tour.
"I've been looking forward to it for the last four years," said Chapman, who got a good feel for the Seniors Tour in his role as a Rules Official.
"As a referee I got frustrated sitting on my buggy watching the guys go round as I wanted to be out there too playing with them," he added.
"I've really enjoyed working with the European Tour field staff but I've been raring to go and looked forward to it immensely.
"It's like starting up again and going back to school. It's a different challenge as there are only three rounds and no cut so I don't know how it will pan out but I'm certainly going to enjoy it. I'm going to play every event I can.
"I haven't thought about goals yet. It will be nice just to go out there with my old mates again and play. There will be pressure, of course, but not as much as the main Tour.
"Obviously I want to do as well as I can. You get about seven or eight years I reckon on the Senior Tour, so you have to work hard for that period of time.
"The Senior Tour is getting really strong. You have Woosie and Bernhard (Langer), and Peter Mitchell won three times in just ten events. I'd love to do what he has done - he has been fantastic.
"Then you've got Gordon J Brand and Sam Torrance as well as people like Mike Harwood coming through and Steve Bennett, who won on the European Tour, so the standard is creeping up and up."
Chapman is hoping his stint as a Rules Official will prove to be a portent of success for life on the Seniors Tour as it has for Gordon J Brand and Carl Mason (pictured). Both were Rules Officials in the interim period between between leaving the European Tour and joining the Senior one. Moreover, each one was been very successful since making the switch.
Brand has won five Senior Tour titles, including back-to-back victories last season en route to finishing second in the Order of Merit, while the prolific Mason has won 20 times and is the leading all time Senior Tour career money winner.
Mason has earned €1,799,375 in prize money and Chapman sees plenty of similiarities between his Tour career and that of his fellow Englishman.
"If I could do half as well as Carl has done on the Senior Tour I'd be delighted," Chapman said. "He has won 20 events so far and it just shows you what a little bit of confidence can do for your game.
"If you look back at Carl and myself on the main Tour we were pretty similar - the journeyman sort of thing - and we both won late in our careers. He left the Tour and went to work as a referee on the Senior Tour, as did Gordon J Brand, so it would be great to do what they have done."
22 June, 2009 | The PGA