Immelman makes post-surgery debut at FBR
By Helen Ross, PGATOUR.com Chief of Correspondents
Once he looked at the CAT scan, Trevor Immelman could see the tumor, plain as day.
It had a stem like a mushroom, almost like a "golf ball on a tee," he recalled wryly. Within a matter of days, Immelman had surgery to remove the mass, which was wedged under his 11th rib and pressing on his diaphragm.
On Thursday, barely six weeks later, Immelman makes his 2008 PGA TOUR debut at the FBR Open. He has a 6-inch scar on the right side of his back, and he didn't play his first 18 holes until last week, but the young South African is anxious to see how he does.
"I wouldn't have come out and played if I didn't feel ready to try and win the tournament," Immelman said. "I don't feel any pain in the incision or anywhere else. I feel like I am ready to play.
"I'm looking forward to it. I feel like my game is quite close. Obviously, I haven't played competitively in a long time so I'm a little brain-rusty, but my game feels pretty good."
Of course, the last tournament Immelman played, he won, beating Justin Rose by a shot at the Nedbank Challenge in early December. He was looking forward to riding that momentum at the South African Airways Open, which is played just 30 minutes from his home, two weeks later.
Immelman felt some pain in his ribcage when he got up that Wednesday morning, though. "It was like I tweaked a muscle," he remembered, but he was able to play in the tournament's pro-am with the aid of a few painkillers.
After his round, Immelman had some physiotherapy treatments, but the pain lingered. When he woke up Thursday morning, his chest was so sore, he couldn't take a deep breath. He felt pain at the top of every swing he took on the range, too.
"But I wanted to play at home in my national open," Immelman said. "I wanted to give it a shot."
He made it a couple of holes before he had to withdraw. Immelman immediately went to his long-time family doctor who ordered x-rays and the CAT scan. When Immelman saw the tumor, he knew something had to be done -- and soon.
"You kind of go from feeling bullet-proof to lying in a hospital bed wondering if things are going to go your way," Immelman said.
When Immelman was put under anesthesia on Dec. 18, he believed that the mass, a benign calcified fibrosis tumor, was attached to his ribs. Doctors planned to cut that piece of the rib out and cover it with a metal plate. The rib would grow back, but the recovery time would be about three months.
Once the surgery was under way, though, the doctors discovered that the tumor was under the ribcage but not attached. So they were able to go between the ribs, cutting through the intercostal muscle and pleura, and shave the stem of the growth from his diaphragm.
Then came the wait to see whether the tumor was cancerous. Immelman was in ICU, on morphine and an epidural for the first four days, so his wife Carminita and the rest of his family did most of the worrying.
"It was some pretty scary stuff, really,'" Immelman said. "I was in the hospital for a while, and it took a couple days to get the results back, so that was pretty hair-raising. But, luckily enough, it's all benign, and it's all been removed, so I should be ready to go."
Immelman got out of the hospital on Christmas Eve. For the first two-and-a-half weeks, he did virtually nothing. Just sitting up and getting out of bed was painful, "so I basically just parked in front of the TV," he said.
"I watched Tiger's tournament on TV and all the tournaments in Hawaii," Immelman said. "I really wanted to be out there, but I had to try and stay patient."
Immelman, Carminita and their son Jacob returned to their home in Orlando in mid-January. By then he was putting and chipping, but it took him another week or so before he trusted that he could take an aggressive, full swing without pain or doing further damage.
Immelman had hoped to return to action last week at the Buick Invitational. He wasn't totally sure he was ready to play five days in a row, though, so he withdrew and set his sights on the FBR Open.
"Also, in desert golf, the rough isn't so thick, and it's not as demanding as playing in the cold, wet conditions in San Diego," he said.
So Immelman finds himself in Scottsdale ready to see what he can do. He'd like nothing better than to play the way he started the 2007 season -- with two top-three finishes in his first five starts -- or ended the year with the win at the Nedbank Challenge.
The middle of the season, though, was imminently forgettable. Immelman, one of the TOUR's most physically-fit players, had been sidelined for nearly six weeks after he contracted a stomach parasite at the Masters. The South African lost nearly 20 pounds from his 5-foot-9, 170-pound frame.
His strength gradually returned, and Immelman felt like he began to return to form in August. After he played in the Presidents Cup, Immelman embarked on a nutritional and training regimen that had him in "probably the best shape I'd ever been," which undoubtedly aided the second recovery.
"Obviously, it's quite perplexing for me," Immelman, who only lost 5 pounds during his latest ordeal, said. "I work so hard on fitness and try to stay healthy and do the right things. It's interesting I got sick so regularly last year."
Immelman said his expectations for 2008 are high. He wants to win again, and he plans to work hard, as always. Make no mistake about it, though -- Immelman won't be taking anything for granted this year.
"We all try so hard to play as well as can," he said. "We make so many sacrifices, and sometimes, when we don't see the results we think should be achieved, we get frustrated.
"But when you can't practice and you can't play or enter tournaments, you really appreciate how much you enjoy playing this game for a living."
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