Commemorating Links to a Friend : A Golfer’s Wake Becomes Yearly Ritual for Family and Chums of Larry Rightmer

The 26-foot Winnebago was hurtling west on a Sunday morning. Twenty golf bags were piled on bunks like stacked cordwood and squeezed into the remaining space were 20 golfers on their way to a round of ugly golf at Elkins Ranch in Fillmore. On the stereo an oldie by the Fortunes, loud enough to be heard over punch lines, zingers and jangling beer bottles, was portending a destiny of hacking and duffing for the hackers and duffers on board the motor home. A particularly disturbing line: “You’ve got your troubles, I’ve got mine.”

“Bad omen,” said Roger Johnson, not trying very hard to convince everybody he was taking golf seriously. “Real bad omen.”

When the Winnebago finally disgorged its stiff and aching passengers after the long ride from the Valley, most of the golfers headed for the practice area in hopes of finding the magic touch. Ron Kraushar (26 handicap) stayed in the camper “because I screw up my game if I practice.” It wasn’t long before he was joined by Bobby Curtis (30 handicap), who had been on the putting green and “didn’t want to leave my game there.” Soon, the camper was packed again. The late-morning sun’s rays were beginning to steam up the course. In a few minutes, the golfers would stuff cold beers in their bags and tee off on an 18-hole adventure, the sixth annual Larry Keith Rightmer Invitational. The LKR, as it’s called, has become a ritual for most of the men, several of whom are from out of town, and a sentimental journey for Larry’s older brother Jerry, 37.

Since 1982, Jerry and his wife Connie, who are from Sepulveda, have been holding the LKR to bring friends together for a long day of food, folly and frolic, but the tournament isn’t just an excuse to get down and party. Underneath all the loud laughter and heavy-duty male bonding is a seriousness of purpose. Like his golfing pals, Larry Rightmer was a man who loved parties, people and life. Then one day the good times ended in tragic suddenness. At 29, Larry Rightmer was dead, bludgeoned by robbers as he slept in a Reno hotel room.

“We played golf the last day I ever saw him,” DeWayne Quirico, his best friend, said wistfully. “He loved the game.”

A tournament, with hats and T-shirts featuring the LKR logo, seemed a fitting way to perpetuate his memory. “We wanted to have his friends remember who he was,” Jerry said. “And we wanted to remind them that you can disappear overnight.”

Rightmer, a bass player with the Sanford Townsend Band (“Smoke From a Distant Fire”), plans the tournament for three months, leads the merrymaking and makes sure that nobody forgets why they are there. On the first tee, before sending them out in foursomes, he solemnly assembled the group for a traditional moment of silence.

“I challenge everybody to live this day like it’s your last,” he told them. “Enjoy the friendship. Enjoy being with each other. You don’t know what tomorrow will bring. Larry didn’t know he’d be gone the next day.”

When noise was restored on the tee, Jerry became just as earnest about his golf game. Despite his assurances that camaraderie was more important than competition, the others were well aware that nobody was going to try harder than Rightmer to win the two-foot-tall team trophy. He is still ribbed about his so-called miracle recovery last year, when he managed to win the tourney despite a bad back that had laid him up for six weeks. According to an observer, “He’d been walking around like one of the Seven Dwarfs.”

Quirico, who lives in North Hollywood, had the bad luck of the blind draw to be the first player off the tee. On subsequent holes, the gallery would diminish as the foursomes began to spread out in a procession of golf carts. But on No. 1, the other 19 players would be scrutinizing Quirico’s form and his drive. A video camera, manned by a nonplayer named Mike Condello, would be recording the moment for history to judge.

Ever since Larry Rightmer had introduced him to golf a decade ago, Quirico has been an intense golfer who takes a lot of pride in his game. Standing on the first tee in his baggy red shorts, he knew the pressure was on. Taking a deep breath, he glared at the ball and then shanked it into the woods. So began the LKR.

By the ninth hole, the beers were getting warm and the golfers were divided into three categories: tepid, cold and below freezing. On successive holes, Paul Andrews, wearing wrestling shoes, had wedged a tee shot in the crotch of a tree and teed a wedge shot into a water hazard. Things got so dire that one foursome was heard congratulating each other on a “nice putt” when the ball came within three feet of going in.

On No. 5, a 405-yard par 4, a foursome approached the green looking haggard and disconsolate. “We’re a pretty serious group,” said Sean McCarthy, who was wearing blue high-top Pumas. “We’ll lighten up as soon as one of us scores below 10.”

Players even began apologizing for good shots, as if a dead-on 5-iron to the green would be a breach of faith. “That was a helluva drive you had on two!” someone yelled to Bill Weiss across the fairway. “Sorry about that!” Weiss shouted back.

The ninth hole was particularly memorable. A 398-yard dogleg to the left, it has an orange grove along the right side of the fairway and a lake to the left. With honors on the last hole, Dave Dellinger was the first of his foursome to hit on No. 9. He could have used Roger Johnson’s advice: “Fade the shot over the orange grove and suck it back with prayer.” Dellinger’s shot fell among the oranges.

Next up was Randy La Roche. In the motor home, he had been one of the guys who didn’t practice “because you get only two quality shots all day and you don’t want to waste them on the driving range.” La Roche hit a tee shot that had quality written all over it until the water got in the way.

He was followed by Jim Divisek, who addressed his ball confidently and blasted a mighty drive into the grove. Virgil Burrell messed up the symmetry by accidentally hitting his ball onto the fairway.

“I should have brought my canteen and machete,” Bobby Thompson moaned after nine holes. “I lost a hat and three dozen balls and shot an 83. What’s good about this game?”

“I’ll tell you what’s good,” theorized McCarthy, who was playing in the same foursome. “Golf gives you a chance to work out your hostilities. It’s a microcosm of life, a common endeavor. It’s sharing the same experience, having empathy for your fellow man, working for the same goals, taking a long look back on other failures in your life. I even like the water hazards. I’m from Michigan. The Great Lakes. Hitting a ball in the water is like delving into the darkness of the collective subconscious.”

“This guy is nuts,” Thompson said. “But, hey, I’m the one who came here without a snakebite kit.”

Not all the holes and shots were proof that drinking and driving don’t mix. One of the players, Alex Kormos, was even par on the front nine. There were a lot of pars and a few birdies, those uncanny moments when everything clicked, the ball sailed true and the golfer felt like joining the pro tour. Todd Pearl will never forget the exhilaration of stroking his tee shot 18 inches from the cup on a 155-yard par 3.

“That’s what makes it fun,” said Pearl, who also will never forget the heartache of missing the birdie putt.

Part of the allure of the LKR is what Connie Rightmer called “a celebration of friendship.” A woman friend of hers prepared sandwiches for lunch and got up at 6:30 the morning of the tournament to make breakfast for the golfers. Another volunteer was Condello, the cameraman, who participated in the fun even though he doesn’t play golf.

“I’ve tried golf twice, and both times it was lawn surgery,” he said. For nearly eight hours, Condello bounced around under the sun in an uncomfortable E-Z-Go golf cart, suffering the agony of the seat but enjoying every bump. “It’s green out here, it’s wonderful, it’s no pressure,” he said, parking the cart under a lonesome pine and watching others deal with sand traps and double bogeys.

As the sun began to dip behind the mountains, the foursomes slowly straggled back to the motor home. Hollow-eyed men told how their respect for the course had risen dramatically during the afternoon: “It was a lot tougher than I thought.” “Ever see such narrow fairways? I spent more time in the woods than a gopher.” But Bobby Thompson was elated for the first time all day. On the 17th, he won the driving contest.

“I hadn’t used my driver until then,” he said. “But what a drive! At least 285 yards. Wait a minute . . . “ He computed the distance again. “Make that 335. I crushed it. I didn’t believe it was in me.”

McCarthy cast a skeptical look at Thompson. “This is under protest,” he said. “We’re checking the driver for cork.”

After Rightmer calculated the score cards, deducted the handicaps and announced the winning team of Bill Weiss and Ron Kraushar, the Winnebago rolled onto the blacktop for the 45-minute trip to Rightmer’s Spanish-style home. Finally, after a catered Mexican dinner and the trophy presentation, the tired golfers sat around the living room watching--what else?-Condello’s videotape of the tournament. Rightmer, smiling as the images flickered on the tube, leaned back in a chair and relaxed for the first time all day.

“This is a party,” he said, “that Larry would have enjoyed. Most definitely.”