April 20, 2021 | BY AAGD STAFF
15-year-old Matthew Vital said he felt pretty good when he teed off at Reading Country Club on Saturday before the Masters for the weekly Philadelphia Section PGA Junior Tour event. Vital figured he had carded a low round when he sank a 6-foot birdie putt at No. 18.
But it was more than just a low round. It was historic. Vital, a sophomore at Bethlehem Liberty High School, had fired an 8-under-par 62 to break the course record of the iconic Sam Snead by one stroke.
In a phone interview from his Bethlehem home, Vital told the Philadelphia Inquirer “I found it pretty crazy….It’s hard to believe because that course didn’t play easy. So it really means a lot that I can break Sam Snead’s record.”
Fom the back tees, which measure 6,162 yards and plays to nines of 34-36, Vital shot a 31 on each side at Reading. Derrick Sandritter, the club’s director of golf, said the tees “were tipped out all the way back” as they were in the 1949 Reading Open, the professional tournament in which Snead carded his 63.
Sandritter described the tree-lined course, built in 1923, as “very old-school in terms of small greens, tight fairways, undulating greens, a shotmaker’s course for sure.”
“It’s definitely not a grip-it-and-rip-it type of course,” said Sandritter who admitted “You’ve got to strategically plot your way around. The first time [Vital] saw this place, and he shoots that. That just goes to show how talented he is.”
Gus Vital, Matthew’s father, noticed how calm and focused his son remained throughout the round. At the end came the great news from the tournament director that his son had broken Snead’s record.
“I was excited for him, and I thought, ‘Wow. That’s a great job,’ and I gave him a hug,” Vital said to the Philadelphia Inquirer. “For him it was like, ‘OK. Good.’ I didn’t see him jumping up and down, and I’m like, ‘Did you know what you just did there?’”
Matthew Vital birdied five of his first 11 holes before running into his only bogey of the day with a long 3-putt at No. 12. After a par at 13, he birdied four of his last five holes, and stayed about as composed as one seeking to break the record of a golf legend could be.
“I tried to slow down,” he said, “because when you get happy about how you’re doing, your adrenaline starts to kick up, and then you start to hit the ball further, and it’s really hard to control your game from that point. So I just tried to slow down and stay calm.”
Snead, a member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, died in 2002 four days before his 90th birthday. He is tied with Tiger Woods for the most PGA Tour victories, 82.
Born in Haiti, Gus Vital started his sons Matthew and his twin brother, Michael, on plastic golf clubs when “they were ages 2 going on 3.” He started much later, taking up the game after college, and was hooked.
With an impressive national victory history, Matthew has won the 12-13-year-old division of the 2019 Drive, Chip and Putt national finals at Augusta National Golf Club the Sunday before the Masters. Now, he has his name linked with one of golf’s all-time legends.
