The merchant banker who could win the Masters

livemint.com:

AUGUSTA, Ga.—Stewart Hagestad had a compelling reason to ask the merchant bank where he works for some time off this week: He was going to the Masters. What separates him from everyone else on Wall Street jetting down to Augusta National is that he’s not there to take in the action at the first major of the season. Hagestad is actually playing in it.

In the 89-man field at golf’s most prestigious tournament, Hagestad is a player unlike any other. He has a business degree and works a full-time job as an associate at BDT & MSD Partners, an investment and advisory firm that has more than $60 billion of assets under management. But once he shuts down his computer at the end of the day, he finds time to play golf.

And the 33-year-old defies every shred of conventional thinking about athletic achievement because he’s playing perhaps the best he ever has even as he spends just a fraction of the time his competitors do on sharpening his game. As it turns out, that’s exactly how he likes it. Unlike almost every other amateur who finds his way into the Masters, Hagestad has no ambition to play the game professionally.

He has known for over a decade that the life of a pro golfer wasn’t for him. Instead, he has reverse-engineered the system. There are athletes who dream of making it in the business world.

Then there’s Hagestad, who has managed to do the opposite. He has a career outside of the sport but still gets to play in the biggest events and on the most hallowed courses on the planet. “Part of the reason I love amateur golf is simply because it gives you the opportunity to miss it," Hagestad says.