On paper, it wouldn’t appear that Jason Day and Michael Phelps have very much in common.
The 32-year-old Phelps, a Baltimore native, is the most decorated Olympian of all time, winning 28 medals in the pool. The Australian-born Day, 30, is a 12-time PGA Tour winner, including the 2015 PGA Championship.
“We just talked about this — everything we do we’re opposites,” Day said. “He has an Omega watch. I have a Rolex. He likes water. I don’t like water. But we work well together.”
When it comes to charity work, they are in perfect agreement.
Phelps and Day teamed up through their charities — the Michael Phelps Foundation and Day’s Brighter Days Foundation — to stage the second annual Golf.Give.Gala in St. Charles.
Sunday featured a gala at Hotel Baker and a concert from country music star Eric Church at the Arcada Theatre.
Day and Phelps were supposed to lead a large group of celebrities in a golf outing Monday at St. Charles Country Club. It was washed out due to rain, but everybody made the most of it.
Current and former Chicago athletes such at Bryan Bickell, Adam Burish, Zach Miller, Patrick Sharp and Kerry Wood and Loyola men’s basketball coach Porter Moser, a Benet graduate, were among the attendees.
“Being able to come back together again, to be able to be back in St. Charles, is great,” Phelps said. “We’re able to come together for things that could change people’s lives, which could make a massive impact.
“To be able to save a life, for me that’s way bigger than anything I’ve done in my career.”
Phelps’ foundation partnered with the Boys & Girls Clubs of Elgin and St. Charles Special Recreation at the event. Portions of Day’s proceeds went to the Lazarus House in St. Charles.
“We’re impacting a lot of people, not only here in St. Charles but across America,” Day said. “That’s what we need to do more of. There are a lot of people in need, a lot of people who are struggling and need the help.
“We’re hoping we can do an even better job this year.”
Phelps said that he was thinking of the impact he could have outside of the pool even as his career was unfolding.
“Being able to have that platform and being able to talk about things that are so passionate to us and make us who we are is great,” Phelps said. “It was the goals and dreams I always had.
“Yes, I did have them in the pool (as well), but I still had them outside of the pool. There are so many things that I still want to accomplish, and I still believe I can do a lot more.”
Day, who won the Farmers Insurance Open in January at Torrey Pines, started the Better Days Foundation with his wife, Ellie, in 2011 after his Presidents Cup appearance. The Michael Phelps Foundation is in its 10th year of existence.
Phelps and Day were happy to join forces for a second straight year to impact as many lives as possible.
“We’re just hoping, like Michael does through what he did in the pool and who he is as a person, and what I’ve done on the golf course and who I am as a person, to get the word out about what we’re trying to accomplish,” Day said. “Days like this definitely help.”
Paul Johnson is a freelance reporter for The Beacon-News.
