Sport changed Robbie Cameron's life; next up is the Deaflympics

The National

9 hours ago

Not for Robbie Cameron, however.
The 38-year-old golfer's first-ever international competition will be the Deaflympics, which is the pinnacle of sport for hearing-impaired athletes.
It is, he admits, going from zero to sixty in the blink of a eye but the personal impact, as well as the potential for raising awareness about deaf sport, is hugely significant to the Glaswegian.
'I'm beyond excited, it's just an absolute dream.' Cameron says of his selection for the British team for the Deaflympics.
'Obviously this is huge for me personally but I also feel like this is a fantastic opportunity for me to raise awareness of this sport and raise awareness of the power of sport.'
It's somewhat serendipitous, and certainly unexpected to Cameron, that he's ended up representing GB on the highest stage for deaf athletes.
As a child, Cameron had full hearing but as he hit his mid-teens, he became aware of gradual hearing loss.
In the early days, it was relatively easy to work around - he'd sit at the front of the class rather than the back and being a self-taught lip-reader helped him navigate the world, too.
But, as he got older, his hearing loss progressively worsened until he reached the point he was forced to wear hearing aides.
Robbie Cameron began losing his hearing as a teenager (Image: .) All the while, Cameron was a keen golfer.
He first picked up a club as a 10-year-old at Eastwood Golf Club (now Eastwood Twelve) in the south side of Glasgow, playing competitively for the club's junior teams and although life got in the way as he hit his late teens and golf become more recreational than competitive, Cameron never lost his love for the game.
And in a fortuitous coincidence, just as Cameron was searching for ways to become more involved in the sport, an email landed in his inbox that would ultimately lead to his selection for GB.
'Out of the blue, an email arrived from Scottish Golf saying there was a qualifying event in England for the Deaflympics and asking if anyone would be interested putting in an application. So I applied and next thing I knew I was invited down to the qualifying event in Stafford,' Cameron, who now plays at Bearsden Golf Club, says.
'It was my first-ever deaf competition and my first time competing at that kind of level so it was quite daunting.
'Prior to this qualifying event, I didn't know anybody my age who has hearing issues so a big part of it for me was just to meet people who also have hearing loss and are also obsessed with golf so meeting a community of people who were like me was something I was really excited about.
'And by the end of the weekend, I'd qualified for the Deaflympics.'
Robbie Cameron at his home club, Bearsden Golf Club (Image: .) There are several challenges of playing golf as a deaf person; the first being the inability to hear fellow golfers shout 'fore' following an errant shot, as well as the inability to hear the club strike the ball and so any feedback that typically comes from this is absent.
However, Cameron still has time to work on his game before the British team departs for Tokyo, with the Deaflympics, which is IOC-sanctioned, not taking place until November and the Glaswegian, whose day job is as a civil servant with the Scottish government, is confident he'll have reduced his handicap of nine significantly by competition-time. And despite his inexperience on the international stage, he's already set himself some lofty targets as he looks towards Tokyo.
'I'm happy I'll have had five months between selection and the event itself to get myself into the right headspace to compete well because I need to make sure there's no nerves and I'm fully focused,' he says.
'The level of golf will be really high and while I want to make the most of the experience, I'd also love to get into medal contention.'
Regardless of Cameron's results come games-time, though, he's already reaped considerable benefits from becoming part of a deaf community that, until recently, he didn't even know existed. And he's desperate to spread the message to anyone else who may be in a similar boat that the power of sport in connecting people remains unmatched.
'When you're a young person and you realise you've got hearing loss, it's a difficult thing to deal with but gradually I started to realise there's good opportunities out there, there's good people out there and actually, now I'm proud of the way I am," he says.
'Sport is so good for bringing people together and if I can share my journey and encourage other people with hearing loss to get involved in sport then that would be fantastic.'
Robbie Cameron is self-funding his trip to the Deaflympics, to donate to his Just Giving page to help with costs click here: https://www.justgiving.com/page/robbiegolfs