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Island-based golf academy set for TV time

IJGA will be subject of reality program

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Natalie Mirra is at the far end of Pinecrest Golf Club's practice range, where Tiger Woods' swing coach implores her to grip and rip.

"Is that as hard as you can swing?" Hank Haney asks.

Haney is not derisive, but he is persistent. So he repeats the question each time the International Junior Golf Academy student sends a mid-iron shot tracking vicar-straight toward a flag about 175 yards away.

And each time, Mirra giggles a nervous response: "Well, no. I'm trying, though."

Mirra is accurate enough, but Haney tells her she needs to ratchet up her swing speed to reach her full potential. Clearly, he is trying to nudge her out of her comfort zone.

If peppering by the man entrusted to oversee the game's most lucrative swing weren't enough to unnerve the average golfer, the television crew, standing just behind Haney with their cameras and microphone booms poised, might do the trick.

But Mirra isn't your average golfer.

Which explains the cameras.

The Golf Channel last month began production on a new reality series scheduled to premiere in September, which will showcase the lives of Mirra and other IJGA students. The working title is "Hilton Head 101," and the show aims to demonstrate how talented young golfers -- many of them away from home for the first time -- balance the demands of golf competition at the highest level with the normal stresses of teen life, including academics.

"These kids are really gifted athletes, but these kids also are just figuring out who they are, as well, and I think that will be a really interesting part of the story," said Jay Kossoff, the Golf Channel's executive producer of original productions.

Kossoff said about 1,500 hours of footage will be pared down to eight half-hour episodes that will air sometime this fall. Filming began with the Jan. 11 start of the spring semester and will continue through the school's graduation and the Tournament of Champions conducted by the IJGA's off-shoot tournament circuit, the International Junior Golf Tour.

The IJGA has 150 students from 23 countries, ranging in age from 12 to 19. Most are high-school age or younger and aspire to become college or professional golfers. There also are 35 students enrolled in a postgraduate program, who are based along with the youngest pupils on Hilton Head Island. High-school aged undergraduates are based on Daufuskie Island.

Filming will include students in all the IJGA's programs.

Kossoff and the IJGA's director of communications, Richard Bisi, agreed that the project might not have been a go without Haney, well-known for his association with Woods. Haney, who has worked with more than 100 other touring professionals and owns four junior golf schools in Texas, became the IJGA's director of instruction this past June and makes monthly visits to the academy.

Though his role is central, cameras will roll on the course and off even when Haney is not at the school.

"We really want the focus to be on the kids and the process they go through," Haney said.

The IJGA began brainstorming ideas for a behind-the-scenes television show about nine months ago, according to Bisi. Kossoff said the Golf Channel was receptive to the academy's pitch because it had been contemplating a similar idea.

The Golf Channel can add "Hilton Head 101" to a lineup of original, reality-based series that includes "The Big Break" and "Road Trip: Myrtle Beach," which premiered last week. The motivation for the IJGA is obvious, Haney said: "This is a tremendous opportunity for our academy to further establish our brand and our presence."

Nonetheless, the IJGA won't control what hits the airwaves and what hits the cutting room floor. The Orland-based company Convergence has been hired to assist in production, and the Golf Channel has creative control over the finished product.

"There are no reservations about that," Haney said. "When you have a show like this, there will be some good things and, inevitably there will be some bad things, too. This is not an infomercial for our academy. This is about what happens here."

He acknowledged that compelling story lines will be essential to the show.

"If everybody shoots 72 and makes straight A's, it's not real interesting, is it?" Haney said. "No one would believe it because that's not reality.

"But I think what viewers will see is how we react when bad things happen. I think people will like what they see, and if you react well to difficult situations, ultimately that's a good thing, too."

If any of the kids or any of their parents object to turning this semester at the IJGA into a television fishbowl, they haven't said so -- Bisi said participation is optional for the students, but all agreed to sign releases to appear in the show.

Not that all are champing at the bit to become television stars.

"I'm not really looking for camera time, let's put it that way," said Mirra, a Boxford, Mass., native who came to the school as an undergraduate and now is in the IJGA's postgraduate program.

Producers are in the process of identifying three or four students who will become the focus of the series. Among the front-runners is Julian Anneberg, who at 16 is the youngest member of the IJGA's postgraduate program, having graduated early from high school in his native Denmark.

Anneberg began playing golf just two and a half years ago, after stumbling upon a set of old clubs in a friend's basement. It took only a year for his handicap to shrink from 40 to 8 and for Anneberg to switch his focus from field hockey to golf.

Anneberg decided to leave home for the IJGA on the recommendation of a friend from Denmark, who also attended the school. He knew of Haney's reputation but didn't know about the Golf Channel project until he arrived Jan. 11 for his first day of orientation.

Immediately, the camera seemed to love him.

"Yeah, they were there as soon as I got out of the car at the IJGA office," said Anneberg, one of the few golfers miked for his instruction session with Haney on Tuesday and interviewed by the film crew afterward.

"I'm not really a nervous person," Anneberg said, "so I don't think having the cameras around will make me nervous."

However, "annoyed" is a possibility he conceded, recounting how he was awakened at 7 a.m. that morning by crews hoping for a quick tour of his dorm room.

"I'm not much of a morning person," Anneberg said.

Mirra, whose scores have dropped from the high 90s to the high 70s since enrolling at the IJGA, said she thinks whatever distraction the cameras pose eventually will melt away.

"I guess it could be a little unnerving having the TV crew here, but the stuff I worked with (Haney) on is the same stuff we work on when the TV crews are not here," Mirra said. "I think we'll block it out and it will be business as usual."

In fact, Mirra even sees a possible benefit to performing in front of the cameras.

"In tournaments, if you're in contention, you have to stand over a putt when you might be nervous," Mirra said. "You have to learn to focus and block out that distraction. I guess the cameras could help us learn to block things out."

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