Cancer’s not going to rule Glenn Joyner’s life

By Peter Owen

WHEN Glenn Joyner made his way to the podium after winning the Australian Legends Pro-Am at the Australian Golf Club in November, every person in the room stood and applauded. 

They were acknowledging not only the man’s ability to play great golf, but his courage and the audacity he’d shown in achieving something he’d been told was impossible.

The people in that room – the best 50-plus golfers in the country – knew Joyner had been diagnosed months earlier with Stage 4 bowel cancer that had spread to his abdomen. He’d undergone surgery and begun a course of chemotherapy that left him weakened and restricted his ability to practice. Doctors had told the 58-year-old he would struggle to play tournament golf again. One even started talking timeframes.

“I said ‘thanks for your honesty, but you don’t know me. I’m not going to be one of your percentages,’ and told him I was going to go out and play,” Joyner said. “I said ‘I’m going to be that guy you tell all your patients about’.”

The doctors were wrong, and Joyner was right. His remarkable victory at The Australian came amidst a nine-day period in which he competed every day on the Legends Tour at the highest level, his only concession to his illness being the use of a motorised cart.

Joyner was playing the first round of the Senior British Open at Gleneagles in July – having qualified for that major event by shooting seven-under 65 in qualifying – when he first realised something was wrong.

“I was struggling to walk up hills,” he said. “I was heaving – really short of breath. I stumbled through the first round and when I’d finished I slept for three hours. That night I slept for another 11 hours.”

Joyner missed the cut and, thinking that his tiredness was perhaps just a sign of jetlag and advancing age, he flew to Calgary, Canada, where he hoped to qualify for the Shaw Charity Classic on the US Tour Champions.

He missed qualifying by a single stroke and, that evening, jogged through the rain with his mate and fellow pro Guy Wall to a restaurant close to where they were staying.

“I knew immediately that something was wrong and Guy and I went to Emergency at a Calgary hospital,” he said. 

Doctors found his haemoglobin level – the number of red blood cells in a litre of blood – was down to 70, less than half the normal level for adult males. He was given a blood transfusion.

“They told me I was lucky I’d come in when I did,” Joyner said. “If I’d taken another flight in that condition, they said I’d have had a heart attack.”

After being treated at Calgary, Joyner flew home to Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, where the former South Australian has lived with his wife Carolyn for the past six years. He underwent surgery at the Sunshine Coast University Hospital to remove a tumour from his bowel and began ongoing courses of chemotherapy.

When I spoke to him, Joyner had just competed in the Wynnum Pro-Am in suburban Brisbane, shooting two-under-par 68. It was his first round of golf for two weeks. 

He was looking forward to competing in all the events on December’s Sunshine Coast swing of the Legends Tour, including the two-day pro-am at Headland, which he is helping to organise with head pro Adam Norlander.

His best friends on tour – Guy Wall, American Perry Parker and Phil Hodge – were competing in that event, and he’d invited old pals John Senden, Wayne Riley, Paul Gow, Peter Senior, Peter Lonard and Victorian Mark Allen, who has had his own cancer issues, to take part.

Joyner sees similarities between his battle with cancer and the game of golf.

“When you play a golf shot you have a choice – fear or freedom,” he said. “I can tell you that you play a lot better if you swing with freedom. This is no different.

“If you think of death, that’s not freedom. That’s fear. I’m choosing to live my life with freedom and enjoy what I do every day.”

Joyner underwent bowel surgery on September 16. He went home 10 days later – in time to watch the AFL Grand Final on television. As he left hospital he told doubting doctors that he’d be playing 18 holes of golf within a month. He did even better, playing a round of social golf at Headland in mid-October. He was back into serious golf less than a fortnight later – competing in the NSW Senior Open at Thurgoona Country Club. Joyner shot rounds of 69, 72 and 72 to finish 12th.

“My preparation was zero, but I visualised how I’d play the course,” he said. “As it turned out, my first round was almost flawless. It was great to be back playing and I drew a lot of strength from getting through that week.”

Joyner has chemo treatment every fortnight – one week on and one week off – and plans his golf around that schedule. 

He walks five kilometres every morning. Then, when he gets home, he climbs four flights of stairs, hops on to an exercise bike and does 100 revolutions, finishing with a series of squats. 

“Climbing those stairs is a challenge, but I know I have to do it. It helps me build up muscle,” he said. 

Joyner speaks repeatedly of the amazing support he’s received from friends and fellow professionals. “The Legends family are a very special bunch of blokes,” he said.

And he says his family – wife Carolyn, twin sons Marcus and Brad, 32 and parents – have been incredible.

“Carolyn has been awesome. We are a great team and she really helps to keep me going,” he said. 

Joyner said he had spent 50 years playing golf and travelling the world, and he’d had to overcome a lot of obstacles to perform at a consistently high level.

“I feel as if I’ve been training for this my whole life,” he said. “If I’m unwell, or if I have to stop playing golf, I want it to be my choice. 

“Until then, I’m going to just keep turning up. I haven’t come this far to only come this far.”