Mark Chapman, a former fencing coach, is on the brink of making crazy golf history. He is hoping to win his sixth world crazy golf title in Kent later this afternoon, a feat that would set a record in the sport and cap years of dedication to a game many treat as little more than a seaside diversion.
Nicknamed The Force, Chapman has represented Great Britain and was crowned world crazy golf champion in 2019. His rise was anything but instant, as it took him ten years to win his first world title. Now, with five already to his name, he stands one win away from a record sixth and a place in the history of the game.
What sets the leading players apart is how seriously they take it. For the pros, the approach is that of any other elite sport star, meticulous and by the book, with precision a priority, something that suits a former fencing coach. Chapman is described as very methodical, learning the courses, making good notes and treating consistency as the key to success.
It is also more demanding than a casual round with the family. Rather than a single round followed by a bag of chips, players go through four, five and in this tournament perhaps seven rounds. They are on their feet all day, repeatedly bending down to pick the ball up and standing back up again, leaving the lower back and the calves aching after days of training and tournament play.
The courses themselves are built to test that resolve, with some holes simply designed to eat you alive. Chapman says the answer is to take your time when settling over a tee shot and to give it maximum concentration, an approach he believes he has proven good at over the years and one he hopes will carry him to the title once again.
His passion has reached beyond the greens, with a filmmaker from Surrey deciding to capture his commitment to crazy golf on camera. The resulting film won a number of screen accolades, including best documentary at the Hastings Rocks International Film Festival, with those involved describing Chapman as intense, analytical and competitive, yet driven by a childlike sense of wonder and the expectation of winning every tournament he enters.
The event is about more than the headline contest. Across the weekend there are also novice, team and junior events, drawing players from across the country and beyond, among them a group from Cambridge getting in some early practice. Spectators line the perimeter to cheer and heckle, and a big crowd is expected to gather at Hastings Adventure Golf to watch the final three battle it out for the world title.
By the closing stages of the championship the record bid was finely poised. Chapman had moved into the final group alongside Rocky Bullen and Murray Thompson, holding a lead of just one shot in what was described as a two-shot contest. With the tournament played over two days and three more rounds to come before the final, organisers said he was very close and right in the mix, though on what they called the key day nothing was yet settled.
The championship has grown sharply since it began at the venue in 2003, climbing from 30 or 40 players to more than 250 taking part this weekend, with entries opening in July and selling out by the end of September. The field has drawn Americans and all the home nations, with players from Germany, Australia and New Zealand among those who have travelled in past years. The course is defined by its windmill, water and ramps, and the trickiest test is reckoned to be hole 11, the lighthouse, which can spit the ball out in any direction.
The finish carries a twist of its own. The final is played under what are called crazy crazy rules, with all three players' balls in play at the same time rather than one at a time. That means a competitor can find an opponent's ball blocking the path and must decide whether to bounce around it or knock it out of the way, adding a genuine element of luck and tactics to the closing round of an otherwise precision sport.