Local group helps disabled attain links access

Nearly 40 years ago, Roy McCoy and an amputee friend started playing golf together and organizing yearly tournaments in Tyler, Texas. In the 1980s, McCoy formed the Texas Amputee Golf Association, which gathered amputees from throughout the state for games of golf. The original organization was later absorbed into the National Amputee Golf Association and was renamed the Southwest Amputee Golf Association.

Today, McCoy, who lives in Round Rock, helps lead SWAGA, which has approximately 300 members from a nine-state area including Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Texas.

"We're growing a little at a time," McCoy said. "We even have some [members] in Illinois and California who are out of our region but have been here for some purpose and played in our tournament and enjoyed it."

The organization offers yearly tournaments and weekly tee times for amputees, and aims to help men and women who have lost limbs get active. McCoy said SWAGA members often encourage each other and talk about new technology in prosthetic limbs.

"We see people who lose a limb, and they think their life is over and they can't do anything," McCoy said. "We give encouragement. ... It's a social gathering of people with a common interest."

SWAGA is an open forum that allows amputee golfers to contact other golfers within the organization. Members also volunteer with amputees in hospitals.

"The main thing is, we want to get people out of their wheelchairs or hospital beds and get active and be competitive," McCoy said. "There's nothing better than to compete and succeed."

512-431-2861, www.amputeegolf1.com