Sam Bennett is one of the top golfers at the 2023 Masters — and everyone wants to know all about the reigning U.S. Amateur champion.
While Bennett is not the youngest athlete competing in the annual tournament this year in Augusta, Georgia — that distinction goes to 19-year-old Gordon Sargent — he is one of the youngest on the green at 23 years old. The Texas native, who is a fifth-year senior at Texas A&M University, is the 2022 U.S. Amateur, a title he earned at the Ridgewood Country Club in Paramus, New Jersey, last summer.
“I definitely earned this championship,” the two-time All-American player told the United States Golf Association after his win. “Beating anybody in this championship is hard, but to knock off the players I did, that’s a pretty good feat.”
Now playing against the likes of golf icons such as Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy, Phil Mickelson and more in the Masters, Bennett is taking the tournament “by storm,” Sports Illustrated declared on Friday, April 7, when the golfer was in second place — just four strokes behind Brooks Koepka.
As Sam competes on the world stage, he heeds the advice from his late father, Mark Bennett, which he has tattooed on his forearm as an important reminder.
“Don’t wait to do something — Pops 6/12/2020,” the ink reads in his dad’s handwriting.
Mark died in June 2021 after a seven-year battle with Alzheimer’s, and his words of wisdom were crucial to his youngest son.
“I was struggling mentally with some things. He told me, ‘Don’t wait to do something,’” Sam recalled of his father’s words in a March 2021 interview with the Associated Press, several months before Matt’s passing. “That was the last advice he’s given me before everything went south.”
Mark, who struggled to speak and write at that point, penned the phrase for his son to keep forever.
“It took him 15 minutes to write it out. He actually wrote it out in his own handwriting,” the golf champion recalled. “It was probably the hardest thing he ever had to do. Now with that on my arm — the tattoo — I’ve got a new pre-shot routine. I just look at it and I say, ‘Don’t wait to do something.’”
Regardless if Sam wins the 2023 Masters — per the Augusta Chronicle, his status as an amateur wouldn’t allow him to receive the $10,000 cash prize — his time on the green is what matters most.
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“Golf was his escape room,” Sam’s mom, Stacy Bennett, told GolfChannel.com on Monday, April 3. “He could just get out there and lose himself. He knew, if he was living out the dream that he had as a small child, that he could just stay the course and go forward.”
Keep scrolling to learn more about Sam:
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