He’s paying them back with each putt.
A Long Island high school golfer with a deeper calling has hit a hole in one — raising $700,000 and counting for the hospital that saved his life as an infant.
“They saved me, so it’s my duty to return the favor,” Skylar Friedman, 17, told The Post.
Now the Laurel Hollow teen is growing the green even more — having golfers enter into a nationwide putting contest for the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, where he had a rare, life-saving lung operation at just 5 months old.
Friedman created the “100 Putt Challenge” last year, a simple concept where golfers from across the US pledge various amounts of money tied to the number of 6-foot putts they sink out of 100.
The challenge can be done by anyone in any environment, such as a course, living room or even an airplane aisle, he said.
“People don’t realize how much it adds up,” said the 12th grader who has been on Portledge School’s varsity golf team since middle school.
“If somebody pledges two dollars a putt and hits 80 of them, that’s $160 easily made.”
Friedman, who dreams of one day becoming a mechanical engineer, has raised over $66,000 toward his latest lofty goal of $250,000. But over the last seven years, he’s already generated $700,000 for the specialized hospital near and dear to his heart.
Rough start
During an ultrasound before he was born, doctors discovered an abnormal mass in the right lower lobe of Friedman’s lungs, which presented the threat of a fatal heart attack.
“It was supposed to be a happy memory of finding out if I was a boy or a girl,” he said, adding that local doctors were unfamiliar with the growth.
“It was a very rare condition that I had. So it was probably the first time they had ever seen it.”
The Friedman family traveled to Philadelphia for their infant son’s successful procedure that required the removal of the bottom of his lung — and he’s “been able to breathe easily and live ever since,” he said.
While he doesn’t remember the intensity or medical marvel, Friedman is well aware of the warmth that the children’s hospital personnel continue to exhibit during his frequent follow-ups — he still travels there twice annually to address his asthma and other conditions.
“Every time I’ve gone there, I’ve just been struck with how overly kind and caring the doctors and all staff are,” said Friedman, who sits on the hospital’s youth advisory council and has given speeches on patient care.
But he wanted to do more. So seven years ago he recruited his long-time golf trainer, Adam Laird, to use their shared passion for the game to make a difference.
“I never knew Sky as a kid who was sick,” Laird said. “I knew him as happy-go-lucky. He doesn’t just think about himself, he uses his success to fill the cups of others. … I take a lot of inspiration from him.”
They began with an “impromptu” golf marathon challenge, where Laird played a whopping 24 hours straight at North Shore Country Club in Glen Head to raise $17,000.
The concept continued and more massive donations started to pour in. Friedman even joined in with a “mini marathon” of 100 holes that left the teen using his putter “as a cane to walk.”
Last year, as a way to “greatly grow the scale” and reach more people, the duo landed on a remote putt challenge. Friedman was touched to recently learn that all his high school teammates will be participating in the challenge next week.
“Now we have people in about a dozen states doing it … and about 1,000 individual donors this year,” said Friedman, who published “It Could Be Worse,” a book about his life in March.
“Giving back, it feels like my purpose. If I can reach one person with my story, then it is all worth it.”
Read the full article here
