Adam Burke, golf
Adam Burke’s academic career is the best the Albert Gallatin School District has to offer. Sporting a 4.5 grade-point average, Burke ranks at the top of a 280-member senior class at AG.
Burke’s athletic career took a much more indirect route, but it still led him to the top.
All of which led Burke to being chosen as Albert Gallatin’s male fall sports selection in the Centennial Chevrolet Scholar/Athlete Spotlight program. The only child of Gary and Nancy Burke of McClellandtown, Adam plans to attend Seton Hill University or Washington & Jefferson College on his way to medical school.
“The long-term goal is becoming a physician in the area,” said Burke, as humble as he is outgoing. “I’ve always wanted to do that, to give back to the community. I’m actually an EMT, so I’m already giving back to my community. It’s volunteer work.”
Burke played golf as a senior for the Colonials, after several years of prodding from AG golf coach Bernie Wydo. But Wydo is more a fan of Burke as a person than as a golfer.
“Rarely do they want to come back here,” Wydo said of Burke’s career ambition. “They want to go where the big time is, where the money is. Did he tell you about being a fireman? He does it all. He might be the No. 1 kid in our school for what he does day in and day out. He’s pretty impressive.
“He doesn’t spare the effort, either. In golf, if I’d say, ‘Hey Adam, you’ve got to go down there and chip for half an hour, he’d be down there chipping. Hey Adam, you’ve got to go putt, he’s down there putting. I would tell him something, he’d work on it. That’s the same way he approaches his studies. He leaves nothing unturned. He does it all.”
“I did (recruit Burke),” Wydo said. “He had been playing golf for three years, but not on the golf team. He was focused so much on his studies because he’s been loaded up on AP classes. I finally convinced him and he came out and, for his first year of playing under the gun, he did quite well. Whatever he does, he focuses right in on it. He gives his all. I was glad he played for us this year.”
“I had a great time this year,” Burke said. “Mr. Wydo tried for four years to get me on the team, but I really focused on my studies so I didn’t really have the time to do both. Like any sport, it’s five days a week and I didn’t really have that kind of time. I was actually shooting. I shot with the trap association for many years and I traveled. I ended up No. 1 in the state in my age group. I’m like retired now.
“I changed over to golf. Mr. Wydo recruited me and said, ‘Why don’t you come out for golf?’ I went to a practice and I really loved being with the guys and playing golf with them. It was just great, so I decided to play.”
“Personally, it went well. It had its ups and downs. My goal was to stay consistent. I wanted to play bogey golf and I knew we’d be OK. Just don’t get angry with yourself. If things don’t go well one day, just go on to the next day and play again and hope it turns around. It was a good season. We won seven matches, so that was a pretty good winning season for us.”
As he mentioned, Burke became a championship-level trap shooter, but that’s not where his athleticism started.
“I rode horses for the American Quarterhorse Association for many years,” Burke said. “I did that for many years, but my horses had some injuries. I actually had a horse die. I had trained this horse for so long, I spent a lot of time with it, getting used to it, training with it. Then after six years, it died. I didn’t want to have to go through that again, that struggle of training and getting to know another horse. I was at the top. I finished fourth in the nation at the Congress in 2009 in Western Riding.”
“From there, I didn’t know what I wanted to do for a hobby, so my dad introduced me to a guy named Joe Kislan. He’s a great shooter and he taught me how to shoot trap. We spent so much time together over the summers. He asked me to go shoot in the American Trap Association league and I decided to try it. I started shooting and I realized that I really loved shooting so much that I wanted to travel for this and really get into this. My first tournament was the PA State Shoot, in Ellysburg, Pa. I won 18 awards and was ranked 15th in the nation among junior shooters. My average was around 97 targets shot out of 100 and I shot around 12,000 targets.”
“A couple of times, we had away matches and he was panicking because he was going to miss out on studying,” said Wydo. “He didn’t want to go to the match. I had to tell him to forget those studies for a couple of hours, come out, relax, get some fresh air, play. When you get home, you can study. That’s how he is, though. Whatever it is that he’s going to do, he’s going to do to the fullest.”
Burke says rather proudly that golf is not in his plans as a collegian. “I’m really just going to focus on the academics,” he said. “The GPA in college will be really important to me to get into medical school.”
He doesn’t rule out an occasional round or two with buddies.
“It’s a gentleman’s sport,” Burke said. “You really see the business side of the world and a lot of deals are made on the golf course. It’s a good sport. You’ll play it until you’re 80 years old.”