Battle Mountain golfer wins fourth-straight tournament

Longtime coach and PE teacher Phil Tronsrue has seen some pretty good athletes come through Battle Mountain. Few, however, have been as unassuming as Makena Thayer.

“If you take a look at a lot of the DI collegiate players and up-and-coming LPGA players, they’re either taller or bigger, physique-wise. And Makena, she doesn’t fall into either of those categories,” the Huskies head golf coach said. “That’s not to say she’s not strong, because she swings all of her clubs well.”

Really well.

Thayer, who was 13th out of 84 golfers at the 2023 state tournament and fourth in 4A last year, has started her junior year on fire. After winning the Devil’s Thumb Invitational on March 24 and the Tiger Tourney a week later, Thayer captured titles on back-to-back days at Cobble Creek and Black Canyon Golf Course in Montrose earlier this week. But the happy-go-lucky golfer isn’t succumbing to any stress even as the wins pile up.

“I don’t know — not really that much pressure,” she said regarding her perfect 4-for-4 start. “It’s good. It’s just fun.”

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What Thayer lacks in sheer physical size she makes up for in technique, course management and — perhaps most importantly — mindset.

“I think the best thing about her is she’s pretty carefree,” Tronsrue said. “If she hits a bad shot, she’ll say, ‘oh well,’ and move on. She doesn’t agonize over bad things. She really has a pretty good head on her shoulders with the game of golf.”

“I think that’s one of my best things,” Thayer said before adding a practical explanation: “Even though it doesn’t happen very much, when I sometimes get a little upset, it never really helps me.”

Over the off-season, Thayer worked with her dad, Kenny, a Class A PGA professional and the owner of the Vail Country Club. The father-daughter pair increased the lag — the angle between the forearm and club shaft during the downswing — to generate extra power. Then, before her first high school tournament this spring, they altered her low attack angle.

“And I started swinging harder,” said Makena Thayer, who routinely outdrives her playing partners by 30-40 yards, according to Tronsrue. “Now my swing is good and it’s working.”

The April 7 Montrose Red Hawk Tournament was a tight affair as the top-6 athletes all went under 80. Thayer collected eight consecutive pars through the back nine before drilling a birdie on her penultimate hole. She’d been going back and forth at the front all morning with Aspen’s Lenna Persson. When Persson double-bogeyed the 13th hole, Thayer glanced at the scoreboard and noticed they were tied. But on Thayer’s final hole, the par-3 11th, the Husky left her drive short of the apron.

“I was really nervous because I didn’t hit my shot on the green,” Thayer said. “So I had to get up and down — but it was good.” The clutch play secured a one-shot victory.

In contrast to Cobble Creek’s open layout and dry conditions, Thayer relished Black Canyon’s straight, cottonwood-lined fairways on day 2. Her stamina from running cross-country in the fall and Nordic skiing for the Huskies through the winter maybe came into play on the back-to-back, too. She poured in four birdies en route to a seven-stroke win as Persson tied for second with Motezuma Cortez’s Amita Crowley at 80. While there wasn’t a specific club working better than any other, Thayer said she was happy to hit it straight — and far.

“I was hitting my driver pretty good (and) I was putting better that day than the first day,” she explained.

As a team, Battle Mountain finished eighth out of 15 squads on April 7, with Bella Williams and Caleigh Kackman shooting 108 and 110, respectively. The following day, the Huskies were fifth — the highest-finishing 3A squad.

“The other girls are starting to get things going,” said Tronsrue, who joined as an assistant coach in 2021 and assumed the head position after Chris Hoevel stepped down to focus on his duties as an AP science teacher at the school this spring.

“We’ve noticed a steady improvement in their scores at each tournament,” the coach continued. “They’ve been shaving strokes, playing well — they act more confident.”

Tronsrue is optimistic about the team’s chances at the 3A Region 4 tournament at Gypsum Creek on May 13. Two full teams and 13 individuals qualify for the state tournament on May 19-20 at Boomerang Golf Course in Greeley. While Thayer may be soft-spoken, her objective there is bold.

“I don’t know,” she answered when asked about her goal for the year. “I kind of want to win states.”