Five With... Golf Canada’s Dale Jackson
The Royal Colwood member was elected VP for Golf Canada in early 2021. Here are five Q&As from a recent interview with Inside Golf’s Jeff Sutherland...
Inside Golf: How did you come to start as a rules official?
(Ed’s Note: Jackson became Golf Canada’s Rules Chair in 2013 and was a member of the 7-person team responsible for the major rules changes in 2019)
Dale Jackson: We had an incident (playing in the Colwood Amateur in 2001) and none of us in the group knew what to do. There was some confusion [about] getting the correct ruling and I thought that maybe I should try to learn the rules. I took my first rules seminar that April and it just grabbed me.
iG: You have officiated at many international tournaments and more than a dozen Majors. Pick one experience that really stands out.
DJ: I’ll tell you what, I’m going to give you three...
My first one was my first Open at Muirfield, the first day. I was standing on the first tee a few minutes before [my] group was going to tee off. I introduced myself to the players. I introduced myself to Ivor Robson, who was still the starter then. So I was just on the side and it just hit me, ‘Oh my god, I’m officiating at The Open.’ Anyway, the players hit, we all walked off the first tee and I had tears coming down my face. It was just unbelievable.
The second time was [in] 2015. It was not really one particular incident but the overall experience when the Open is at St. Andrews. The whole experience is just magic.
The third is still going on and it’s the quality of the people you meet. I know it’s cliche but it’s just so true. I have friends I keep in contact with all over the world.
iG: Did you always think you would move from the rules side to the administrative?
DJ: When I first went on the Board, I never thought I’d want to be an officer or president. I can’t really give you one sort of logical point where that changed. At some point, you just start to think, ‘If I’m just going to finish this whole experience, I should probably see if I could do this part of it too.’ Part of the motivation was that Royal Colwood had never had a Golf Canada or CLGA president. And I thought that’d be pretty cool to have that as part of the Club’s history. That’s certainly not the only reason but it is part of it.
iG: What do you see as being unique about Golf Canada?
DJ: We have a very broad scope of operations. When you consider our support of [growing] the game initiatives, elite player development programming, running the RBC Canadian Open and CP Women’s Open, programming for member clubs and golfers, as well as being involved in international committees setting rules, amateur status, and handicap and course rating, we have a very broad and intense scope of operations. We have an excellent staff that [is] incredibly devoted to Golf Canada and the game of golf.
iG: What do you see as Golf Canada’s core mandate?
DJ: We exist to serve our member clubs and member golfers but we also exist to serve — and this is important to me — the game of golf in Canada. So, even though we may not have every golfer in Canada as a Golf Canada member, we do view ourselves as responsible to everyone.
Bonus Question
iG: You are slated to become Golf Canada’s president in a couple of years. What do you see as your role in that position?
In reality, I view the president’s role as one of building consensus... Hopefully letting people do their jobs, getting out of staff’s way, enabling our Board to function properly. It’s not like Lawrence of Arabia charging into the desert exhorting everyone to follow, the President should build consensus to help the organization move forward.