The award is annually presented by Golfweek to an individual who has made significant contributions to senior amateur golf.
Mike McCoy does not mind the solitude of a practice session. In fact, he relishes it. That’s often when the magic happens.
“So much of golf you do alone,” McCoy said. “You go out and you’re chipping and putting and you’re by yourself. You’re dreaming those big dreams while you’re out there and you’re thinking about, ‘OK, if I can keep driving it in these fairways, if I can keep pitching the ball up by the hole, if I stay steady and make these short putts, I’m going to have a really good week.’”
McCoy, at 63, had one of those last August when he won the U.S. Senior Amateur, becoming the only male player in history to win both the Senior Amateur and the U.S. Mid-Amateur, which he won in 2013. He has lived a full life in the game, racking up championships stateside and abroad, but perhaps the lesser-known chapter of McCoy’s career has been his service to the game. That part has unfolded through his work with the Iowa Golf Association, the Trans-Mississippi Golf Association and the U.S. Golf Association. For those contributions and for the humble-yet-fiercely competitive way in which he represents the game, McCoy has been named the 2025 Yancey Ford Award winner. The award is annually presented by Golfweek to an individual who has made significant contributions to senior amateur golf.
“Naturally, I love to compete, love to play in tournaments and that’s always been a priority, but I’ve also made time to give back and make sure that the tournaments, each year they get a little better and we get a little stronger field and we go to a little better venue,” McCoy said. “You just try to make them better each year and I took a lot of pride in that.”
For McCoy, winning the Ford Award presented an opportunity to reflect on his life apart from playing. He began his long stint of service to the game as a director on the IGA board. Along the way, he was asked to become a USGA committee member and, later, after competing in a Trans-Miss Amateur, was asked to get involved with that organization as well. He spent several years chairing the Trans championship committee (and notably, won the tournament twice).
In 2019, McCoy was awarded the USGA’s Ike Grainger Award, which is presented to individuals who have served 25 years with the USGA as a volunteer.
John Bodenhamer, the USGA’s Chief Championships Officer, met and befriended McCoy even before he arrived at the USGA in 2011. When Bodenhamer worked for the Pacific Northwest Golf Association earlier in his career, he crossed paths with McCoy one year when McCoy traveled to The Olympic Club in San Francisco to play the Pacific Northwest Amateur. The two hit it off and Bodenhamer has spent 25-plus years watching as McCoy’s career unfolded.
“The way that I would describe Mike, he’s one of those rare individuals that, I don’t know that he has any enemies,” Bodenhamer said. “He’s just one of those guys that everybody really likes and respects. He’s an intense competitor but he’s just got an approachable way about him. You feel like you’re just with your brother or your dad or just a really good friend and then he’ll rip your heart out on the golf course. It’s a really unique thing.”
Bodenhamer knows the importance of venue in making a USGA championship what it is. As such, it means something when Bodenhamer ticks off some of the great courses on which McCoy has won his major amateur titles through the years: the 2013 Mid-Amateur at the Country Club of Birmingham, the 2022 British Senior Amateur at Royal Dornoch and last year’s Senior Amateur at Oak Hills Country Club.
“He’s the course horse,” Bodenhamer said. “He really rises to the occasion where the great architects have built what we like to call the cathedrals of the game, the greatest places in the game. It’s pretty cool to see that and I think that’s a great reflection of his game. He has no weakness. He does everything really well and I think it’s just a testament to his steadiness and his determination.”
Bodenhamer was the man to call McCoy to see if it was the right time in his life to captain the 2023 Walker Cup matches at the Old Course at St. Andrews. And naturally, Bodenhamer was at St. Andrews for those matches when McCoy led the U.S. squad to victory.
The image of McCoy standing on the iconic 11th tee, puffing a stogie in his silently anxious way as singles matches unfolded, sticks with Bodenhamer to this day. And then, when the U.S. had won, Bodenhamer remembers the way McCoy settled his team with the gentle reminder to temper their excitement as Great Britain & Ireland players were in their own team room, just a wall away, hurting over a home-soil loss.
McCoy’s humble nature is a legacy which goes far beyond winning championships. Still, McCoy maintains an undeniable edge in competition, as evidenced by his latest U.S. Senior Am win. His love of practice has a lot to do with that.
“I guess you might say I’m a late bloomer,” McCoy said. “I had success in the Mid-Am a little later than most and in the Senior Am. I think most of the guys that win it tend to probably be in their 50s and I’m 63 now.”
Few days go by that McCoy doesn’t find the time to work on his game. He will works with various coaches and when something feels off in his game, he addresses it. It all contributes to a constant feeling of preparedness, which may be McCoy’s real superpower where competition is concerned.
“I’m always trying to prepare for the next tournament,” he said. “I always feel ready to go. You could call and say, ‘Hey, we’re having a big tournament this afternoon,’ and I wouldn’t panic. I’d feel ready to go, my game would feel ready.”
This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Mike McCoy wins Yancey Ford Award after stellar senior amateur season
Category: General Sports
