Love Golf? Hate Golf? Both Can Help Cure IRDs and LCA!

Birdies for Charity is a great program that we joined this year to help us raise awareness about Leber congenital amaurosis (LCA) and to help raise funds to cure LCA and other rare inherited retinal disease (IRD). For golfers, it’s a chance to be part of the Travelers Tournament, a decades-long tradition that brings the PGA tour’s top players to Connecticut. (add link here.) For non-golfers, it’s an easy, fun way to help Sofia Sees Hope by making a pledge as low as two cents per birdie.

It’s very simple and works like a walk-a-thon. People pledge some amount per birdie, just like they might pledge some amount per mile walked in a disease walk-a-thon. In this case, they usually pledge anywhere from two cents to one dollar per birdie, because professional golfers are likely to make about 1800 birdies during the tournament.

This part is for the non-golfers! A birdie means they hit “one under par” for a given golf hole. Par is the number of strokes (times you hit a golf ball) a person is likely to need to get the ball in the hole. A professional is expected to do much, much better than the average golfer, so they would normally be under par most of the time, requiring fewer strokes than normal people would. So they make a lot of birdies!

For the real golfers and fans, we have a limited number of day passes available for people who pledge. First come, first served, so click here to go to our dedicated Birdies for Charity page now!