Doug Bauman of Lakewood, the club professional at Biltmore Country Club in North Barrington, has spent his life around the golf course. The 58-year-old regularly competes in local competitions. Most recently, on May 28, he won the Illinois PGA Senior Match Play Championship at Shoreacres Country Club in Lake Bluff. He finished 1 up on Jim Sobb in the final match to claim his second-consecutive Illinois PGA Senior Match Play Title.

I really got into golf when my family moved to Racine, Wisconsin. I had no pals to run around with, so my parents bought me a pass to the golf course. I started going out there in the mornings, and I met other kids there. I spent two or three summers where that's all we did. We played golf and came in and had lunch and putted for dimes on the putting green and then went out and played again. I got fairly good in my seventh- and eighth-grade years.

I was kind of drawn to it because of the individual nature of the sport. If your team wasn't that good, you could still perform well based on how you did. I had a lot of lousy basketball teams and lousy baseball teams. But in golf, you have nobody to blame but yourself if you played badly.

I went to University of Wisconsin-Madison and played golf. It was great. We had a really fun golf coach who opened up the whole business side to me. He was also a club pro at Madison. I liked the business so much that I went to work for him when I got done. I worked for him as an assistant for six years and then came down to Pinecrest in Huntley. That was my first head professional job in 1985. I worked at Pinecrest for five years. Then I got the job here at Biltmore Country Club in Barrington.

When I got out of college, I tried to play in the PGA tour and was not successful in getting a card. I qualified for one Milwaukee Open, back in the 80s. I played in eight Western Opens back when they had local qualifying. I played in one senior U.S. Open. The rest of the time, it's club professional events on Mondays. I just like the competition.

I try to get all the kids at the club here to love the game, because it is a game for a lifetime. You can play it all the way until you're 70 or 80 years old if you want. It's a game where, because of the handicap system, you don't have to be of equal ability. You can play with people of all abilities. And most golf courses are in beautiful settings. It's a good family activity and just being out with your friends makes it a really fun day.

My goal now is not to get worse. Right now, I'm 58. I'm battling a bad back, so I'm just trying to maintain my ability so I can keep playing competitively. I want to be able to go out on Mondays and be competitive. I don't have dreams of playing professionally on the tour. That's passed me by. The game is still fun for me, and I still like competition. That's why I do it.

• I'm Just Saying is a weekly feature with reporter Mike DeFabo. If you have suggestions, contact Mike at mdefabo@shawmedia.com or on Twitter @MikeDeFabo.