Ryan Bishop took a salary cut to transition from being an options broker for the Chicago Board of Trade to the men’s and women’s golf coach at the Gary, Ind., university. “It doesn’t matter how much money you make if you are miserable,” Bishop said.
It wasn’t long ago that Ryan Bishop was working as an options broker for the Chicago Board of Trade. Now, he’s making $12.50 an hour as the Indiana University Northwest men’s and women’s golf coach in Gary, Ind., the Chicago Tribune reported.
Now, he splits his time between South Gleason Park Golf Course in Gary, Ind., the Brassie Golf Club in Chesterton, Ind., and Youche Country Club in Crown Point, Ind., helping golfers. He is also an assistant coach for the boys golf team at Crown Point, the Tribune reported.
“It doesn’t matter how much money you make if you are miserable,” Bishop said.
Bishop left his job in 2010. He moved on from the CBOT by working for PNC Bank. Although he didn’t transition into golf right away, Bishop always had been a pretty good player. Bishop was hovering around a 4-handicap when he decided to try to get his teaching certificate from the United States Golf Teachers Federation in 2012. He did it as a dare, the Tribune reported.
It’s a weeklong process of classroom time and playing. The final exam is a 36-hole playing test. Students have to shoot a designated score, usually in the 70s, to get certified, the Tribune reported.
“I didn’t care that much about missing an eight-foot putt,” he said. “In the pit, I could lose a million dollars in seconds. That was pressure.”
In 2013, Bishop answered an advertisement for an assistant at Crown Point. Bulldogs coach Jonathan Haas offered him the job after interviewing him, and Bishop settled into a role as the swing expert for the team. His star pupil was Mike Lee, a three-time state qualifier, who played at Toledo. And last spring, Bishop received a call from IUN to coach, the Tribune reported
Using South Gleason for practice and Brassie for matches, Bishop recruited kids from IUN with the promise of free golf. He will run fundraisers for scholarship money and figure out a way to keep his players sharp in the winter, hoping IUN will compete with Purdue Calumet, soon to be Purdue Northwest, the Tribune reported.
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