Turner Ashby's Wes Riddle

Wes Riddle might not consider himself a mathematician. Yet he is the embodiment of a fundamental rule in math: a negative times a negative equals a positive. After two near misses at making the varsity golf team for Turner Ashby High School, the junior opted to do something different on the golf course – volunteer. And his shift in focus, from player to mentor, paid off for him in opportunities and experiences of immeasurable value. Plus one very tangible result – a $10,000 college scholarship.

For the past two years Wes, the son of Jodi and Warren Riddle, has logged over 600 volunteer hours at Heritage Oaks Golf Course in its First Tee of Harrisonburg program. His duties are too numerous to list but include working in the heat of the summer and in the hours after school to assist with everything from hauling young First Tee participants in a golf cart to various instructional areas around the course to helping with administrative efforts in the office entering data and answering phones.

His motivation is sincere and simple. “I love to help the kids,” he said.

There’s little about the golf program that Wes hasn’t experienced first hand.  His association began 10 years ago when he entered as a participant at the age of 6. Today, he steps in and leads by example, following his natural instincts to help others.

“If the doors are open, Wes is involved,” offered an appreciative Randy Combs, Director of Instruction for The First Tee of Harrisonburg, on the contributions the 16-year-old has made to the program. “[The kids] all love to be around him.”

By all accounts, he is a perfect fit for a program whose objective is to promote character building through the game of golf by using the 9 core values of honesty, integrity, sportsmanship, respect, confidence, perseverance, courtesy, and judgment as a part of instruction. Perseverance, he has demonstrated quite well. Rather than getting frustrated by or quitting the sport that seemed to deny him initially, he embraced it even more and promoted it through hundreds of hours of his own time.

It is this type of character that prompted the local chapter of The First Tee to not only name him its “2010 Volunteer of the Year” but to further nominate and support him for the national “Outstanding Participant Award” presented by The First Tee.

Matthew Mann, then Executive Director of The First Tee of Harrisonburg, described Wes in his letter of recommendation as one who “lives, eats, and sleeps The First Tee mantra, and is dedicated to educating everyone possible about what The First Tee is and how it has influenced, inspired, and impacted his life.”

Wes with President Bush following the awards presentation. Click to see larger version.

By December of last year, his application for the national award had made it up the chain and Wes was informed he was among the top eight semifinalists. In January, they notified him that he had ascended to the top three. The amount of his award was not divulged at that time but he was told it was something good – really good. In February, Wes and his family traveled to San Antonio to attend the First Tee’s National Network Meeting where he accepted a $10,000 scholarship check in front of over 900 attendees, one of whom was President George W. Bush.

A chat about golf and a picture with the 43rd president, who had been named Honorary Chair of the First Tee at that very event (succeeding his father in the role), was certainly the major highlight of Wes’s week in San Antonio. That is, if you don’t count being interviewed by the Golf Channel’s Todd Lewis and then getting to sing a solo to the huge audience that included not only President Bush but PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem along with First Tee and corporate executives. And well, winning $10,000.

“It was just a GREAT experience,” said the humble, soft-spoken junior about his extraordinary trip to San Antonio.

Performing in front of a president might seem a bit overwhelming to many. Of course, when it is your SECOND time singing for a US president, maybe things are a little easier. In 2009, as a member of the Shenandoah Valley Children’s Choir, Wes entertained Jimmy Carter in a performance at James Madison University. A talented tenor, he is a member of Turner Ashby’s elite 16-member “Chamber Choir,” a group that requires a great deal of dedication of its own in practicing at 7 AM on school days.

After school on certain days, though, The First Tee offers Wes an additional – and somewhat unusual – opportunity to mentor in a way not typically associated with a golf-oriented program. He and Combs put considerable effort into the First Time Offenders Program which brings in local youths charged with a non-violent crime and offers them the opportunity to complete a 9-week program focused on The First Tee’s 9 core values philosophy. Successful completion in the program gives the recommended youths a clean slate and Combs reports a high degree of success in the program’s ability to keep these teens from making a second serious mistake. Combs credits Wes for the positive contribution he makes to the program in providing such a strong model of character to these youths, sometimes students in his own school.

Wes accepts his check from PGA Tour Commissioner, Tim Finchem (at Wes's left). Click to view larger version.

Added Mann in his letter to the awards committee, “We could not imagine a young person who wants to give every second of his day to students who he doesn’t know or other young adults who have had lapses in judgment and have ended up in trouble, but that is who Wesley Riddle is.”

One of Wes’s next objectives with the local chapter is to assist in recruitment efforts of sorts. They want to encourage more players in the middle and high schools to take advantage of the tremendous facility there that includes video cameras and flat panel TVs for swing analysis, indoor hitting bays for use in inclement weather, along with practice and playing privileges at Heritage Oaks Golf Course.

When asked where he plans to apply that hefty college scholarship check, Wes shrugged slightly indicating some indecision but added that staying relatively close to family was important to him. Combs, who sat nearby, could not resist a smile as he listened in. It is clear that the translation for him was that his right-hand man would be remaining close to the program that is so important to both of them.