[PHOTO: David Tease/Golf NSW]
Armed with the presence of his father, Ken, and words of encouragement from Adam Scott and Min Woo Lee, Jeffrey Guan will tee off on the year’s most inspiring sports story when he returns to competition less than 12 months after a devastating accident left him blind in one eye.
MORE: Jeff Guan, blind in one eye after freak accident, confirms INSPIRATIONAL comeback to pro golf
As first revealed in an exclusive story published by Australian Golf Digest last month, Guan will tee up at this week’s Tailor-made Building Services NT PGA Championship at Palmerston Golf Course in the Northern Territory.
It’s been only 11 months since Guan returned to Australia in September 2024 after the PGA Tour’s Procore event in Napa, California, where he was playing on a sponsor’s invitation and missed the cut by a single shot. A week later, during a qualifying tournament on the New South Wales South Coast, a ball hit by a pro-am partner smashed the left side of Guan’s face. He was airlifted to hospital and underwent multiple surgeries that were unable to reverse the loss of vision in his left eye.
Photo: David Tease/Golf NSW
But the 21-year-old from Bexley in Sydney’s south undertook a truly inspirational journey back to the Aussie tour that required him to re-learn how to write, drive and play golf after his vision loss. The Challenger PGA Tour of Australasia granted Guan a medical exemption to have full status this season and the NT PGA starts on Thursday.
“I’m really excited for this week,” Guan said on Tuesday from Darwin. “I’ve been practising quite hard. My dad has come here with me and I’ve got no expectations. I think I’m just going to play and see where my game’s at – see whether my tournament golf spirits come back or not. The game is feeling pretty good.”
Guan, a member at The Australian Golf Club in Sydney, where he has been mixing over-par and under-par rounds, said he was not putting any pressure on himself. He still finds it challenging to assess depth perception, especially in bunkers. It’s still the middle of a long journey.
“Most of the time I’m going into tournaments with no expectations, so this week is just a week where I can get a sense of where I’m at,” Guan said. “I just love being back and playing golf again.”
The most difficult part of the recovery process?
“I think it could have been when I lost the eyesight and then the depth perception became really bad, really poor,” Guan said over the phone. “I couldn’t really even pick up a bottle [of water] at the hospital. It didn’t help that I couldn’t go outside. I couldn’t walk [for a period of time] because I had to keep the eye clean and stable.
“Coming back from that 12-month process and escalating slowly, to driving in a car and then slowly chipping and putting was probably the hardest process.”
While he was gearing up for his return, Guan fielded messages of support from around the world. There were direct messages on social media from strangers and even text messages from 2013 Masters champion Adam Scott and this year’s Houston Open winner on the PGA Tour, Min Woo Lee.
“There’s been golfers and even [people on social media I haven’t met] who have gone through the same incident and it’s really helpful,” Guan said. “Min Woo and Adam have reached out. Adam has got such great character; he’s such a role model. His message was along the lines of, ‘Get well, I hope you recover soon, and want to see you smashing it back out there on tour.’”
