Kern: An amateur golfer with major perseverance

YOU COULD sense something wasn't right, well before we would realize it for sure, when Virginia Elena Carta first draped a golf towel over her head.

That was on the fifth green Sunday afternoon at Springfield's Rolling Green Golf Club, during the second 18 holes in the championship match of the U.S. Women's Amateur.

As signs go it probably wasn't a good one, even if few of those watching - either in person or on TV - probably thought too much of it at the time.

But it would soon become a huge deal. Quite possibly the deciding factor, of a captivating final.

No one will ever know for certain.

Still, this much is clear: By the time the Italian sophomore-to-be at Duke and reigning NCAA champion was playing No. 13 down two to 16-year-old Korean and reigning U.S. Junior Amateur champion Eun Jeong Seong, she looked like she was in desperate need of a cool bath, air conditioning or an IV. Maybe all three.

She looked, well, out of it. At one point she grabbed hold of her caddy, Roberto Zappa, her national coach from back home. Later she asked a rules official a few questions about what she could or couldn't do, just in case. Amazingly, she wound up winning the hole with a par, to get within one with five to go.

Yet that's when she finally couldn't go on any longer. At least not until she requested and received a 15-minute break, which the rules allow. That's when medical personnel examined her, gave her more liquids (she'd been drinking water and had a soda at 10 to get some sugar) and waited by her as she laid down under a tree with a wet towel across her forehead.

Carta, who apparently was suffering from dehydration, acknowledged there was a moment or two when she wasn't sure whether she'd be able to continue. But, as it turned out, only a brief one.

"I wasn't feeling good, at all," she explained afterward. "My dream was winning. You play to win. I didn't expect to feel that bad on the course. That's not the way you want to play the last nine holes of the final."

It was a long day. At the end of a long week.

"I was dizzy," Carta went on. " (Zappa) said, 'Let's call medical.' I was like,'No, I can do this.' It just got worse. It can happen. It would have been better if it were windy and cloudy.

"I want to challenge myself. Giving up is not in my character. I wanted to give it a try, no matter how it goes. That's my personality."

It's a personality that won her a bunch of fans here, even before this happened. Her struggle to finish only made the attraction that much more compelling.

So continue on she did, although it was obvious she wasn't all there. She lost the difficult par-3 14th with a bogey, which made her situation almost impossible. But she would make a 30-foot birdie putt from a collection area just off the green at 17 to force another hole, which pretty much said everything. On 18, she left herself another 35-footer for bird. But Seong never gave her a chance to extend things to extra holes by rolling in a 40-footer herself.

"The putt at 17 was pretty important, I think," Carta smiled. "You never know how golf is, until the last putt. I was actually ready to make one more putt to play a playoff hole . . . I did not lose. (Seong) was the winner.

"I still believed in it. At the 14th hole, my caddy told me I had two choices: either play or you're done right now."

Carta played on. And gave everyone who was walking alongside her some enduring images to take away with them.

"I get emotional," she said in the clubhouse, some 15 minutes after she had to sit through the 20-minute prize presentation. "Right now it's hitting me . . . Sportsmanship was like the best part of it, I think."

Not to mention perseverance, determination, grit, want-to, whatever, after it looked like mostly a lost cause. And when you're basically wobbling your way through a couple of holes while you try to get your body to somehow regroup. Not easy. Or maybe recommended. But that's what competitors do, even if it doesn't get them the trophy.

"I was shaking during practice putts (on 14)," Carta said. "It's not a good feeling. It was unbelievable. I drank so much water. They said the sun was hitting down a lot. The main problem was I wasn't able to breathe properly. And my heart rate was high. It was crazy insane. That's the first thing they checked. Once I settled down it got a little bit better. Then we had that walk up the hill at 17, and I felt it go up again. I was super worried . . .

"I was eating bites of bananas, (health) bars and nuts (on) every single hole. That's what was really surprising. I kept myself in a perfect way, stayed on top of things. But sometimes that can (still) happen, on days like this. Especially after seven days."

She didn't ask why. She just responded, the only way she knows how. It wasn't the dream she was aiming for. But it's what will stay with many of us. And that should be enough.

@mikekerndn