BERLIN — Jackson Roman, closing in on an historic achievement, pulled his tee shot off to the left.
He felt shaky, suddenly tired. There were times his caddie and younger sister, Kenna, an accomplished collegiate golfer herself, had been able to buoy him during the 2024 Connecticut Open. She’d point to their parents, hiding behind trees or walking away to try to hide their own nerves, and they’d both laugh. Or she would just tell her brother something like, “dude, you’re good, just hit the ball,” and he’d breathe and relax.
But this wasn’t merely a pressure point in a golf tournament. Jackson Roman, who has been managing Type 1 diabetes, heard his cell phone and monitors beeping, sirens signaling his blood-glucose level had fallen too low, and the answer was tucked in his bag, a quick-acting honey gel pack.
“When I feel a low coming on, I get a little bit shaky and things start to move quickly,” Roman remembers. “I’d just hit a pretty bad shot. We found the ball and I was able to take a moment during the search to recover a little bit. I took a knee for a second, let the honey I took get into my system. I dealt with it pretty good.”
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With Kenna Roman, who plays for Stonehill College, his solid sounding board, Jackson punched the ball out of trouble and saved par on that 11th hole at Shore Haven Golf Club in Norwalk, July 31 of 2024. Then he one of his his best shots of the tournament on the next hole. He birdied 12, 13 and 18 to clinch the tournament, 12-under for 54 holes, the first amateur in 16 years to take home a Connecticut Open title.
“I’ve had events, my first events starting out as a diabetic, where something would happen during the round and it kind of derailed me,” Roman says. “Winning in golf is hard on its own, especially a tournament like the Connecticut Open with a big field and a lot of great players, so I definitely found some validation and some assurance. I’ve seen some PGA Tour players win who are Type 1 diabetics, and now I was able to get a win under my belt as a Type 1 diabetic.”
Roman, 22, who plays out of Shuttle Meadow CC, still an amateur, will be trying to repeat as state champ at Black Hall Club in Old Lyme July 27-30. He’s also trying to qualify for the U.S. Amateur Golf Championship in August, as he did last year, though he would have to win the Met Amateur qualifying event beginning July 31 to get back there. Meantime, Roman spends his summer days practicing at his home course and he shot a round at Black Hall this week to get acclimated for this year’s Connecticut Open.
For a kid who began following his father around Shuttle Meadow, swinging plastic sticks as a toddler, Jackson Roman has come quite a way.
“I started competing at U.S. kids golf events when I was 5 of 6,” he says. “I think my first year, I came in dead last, which my family still likes to laugh about. There’s different levels to being very good at it. I played different sports, swimming, basketball, soccer. Halfway though high school, I had to decide, do I want to keep going like that, or focus on one thing.”
At Hamden Hall, Roman played with Ben James, one of the best junior players ever in Connecticut, who now plays at Virginia, with some PGA events, such as the pre-Signature Event Travelers, on his resume.
“I would see Ben, and he would put in incredible amounts of practice,” Roman says, “so I was able to see, ‘this is what I could get out of the game if I apply myself like he did.’”
Roman wasn’t getting a lot of college offers, but during the pandemic period, when golf was one of the few activities considered safe, he put his time in. Before his senior year of prep school, Loyola coach Chris Baloga offered Roman a spot in his Division I program. Roman has since graduated, but has a year left due to a medical waiver, and he will return to Loyola.
“I’m really thankful Coach Baloga gave me an opportunity, for him to give me a spot meant the world to me,” Roman says. “I’ve gotten better every single year there.”
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The summer before his sophomore year in college, Roman lost more than 40 pounds and felt weak, which he at first attribute to the heat and his workouts. As his symptoms worsened, he came home and was correctly diagnosed in November 2022, and immediately asked, would this end his golf career?
“Looking up athletes who have it was definitely re-assuring,” Roman says. “J.J. Spaun, who just won the U.S. Open, is a Type 1 diabetic, (PGA player) Eric Cole is a Type 1 diabetic. No disease is fun to have at all, but being a Type 1 diabetic, there’s a culture, a group of people, a good support system. Once you figure out how to deal with it and manage it, not every day is perfect, but you learn, ‘this is just it, this is how life is.’”
Roman wears an insulin pump and a BG sensor at all times, his iPhone synced in. On the golf course, carries several types of snacks, the honey gels, fruit, nuts and high-carb granola bars to counteract any symptoms that arise. “I’m still learning,” he says. “Every diabetic would say, ‘I’m still learning.’”
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As Roman navigates his condition and this summer’s schedule of events, David Knott, a behavior design and performance coach, has helped with the mental side of the game, “reframing” a negative event into a positive.
“You don’t win many times, which means you’re losing a lot,” Roman says. “Understanding how to digest that and still take positive things away from that has helped me a lot of the last couple of years.”
Jackson Roman grew up around golf in Connecticut, and he knows all the names, the local legends who won the Open before him. As he rejoins the pros and top amateurs to go for another state title, he begins to look ahead to his future goal — how to get to the PGA Tour. He’ll turn pro after his last college season, and chart the course of qualifying schools for developmental tours such as Korn Ferry or PGA Americas.
Whatever obstacles the game, or the devices he wears throws his way, Roman can manage it.
“In golf, the margins are so slim,” Roman says. “It’s definitely something that is in reach and I can get to. It’s so hard to get there, but it’s cool to know, ‘there it is.’ My goal is to get there, and I expect to. You’ve got to believe in yourself.”
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