April 18, 2000

Gold Rush Front Page

By Jay Reddick

Maria Beautell and Nuria Clau seem almost like sisters sometimes.

The two finish each other's sentences, and they have tons of shared experiences to talk about -- the latest coming as teammates on the women's golf team at Wake Forest.

It's no surprise that the two freshmen would stick together. After all, they both came to Wake Forest from Spain knowing no one but each other and a couple of Deacons teammates, and both enjoyed similar rises to the tops of leaderboards from almost the moment they set foot on campus.

Their friendship dates back about five years, to the Spanish junior-golf circuit.

"When I started playing tournaments in Spain, there was the same bunch of people at most every tournament, and so we all got to know each other," Clau said. "Maria and I played on the Spanish national team together, and we were at the top of the Spanish under-14 rankings, so we got paired together a lot and just started talking and hanging out together."

The friendship has paid off for Deacons coach Dianne Dailey, who counts Beautell and Clau as her third and fourth recruits from that tight-knit group of Spanish juniors, along with two-time All-American Alexandra Armas and former ACC champ Marta Prieto, a junior.

The two newcomers have each had more than their share of success already. Beautell finished second at the Lady Paladin in the fall, shooting 216 but losing in a playoff for the championship, Clau lost the Mercedes-Benz in a playoff after shooting 217. Beautell has five top-20 finishes in six events heading into the ACC championship, Clau has six.

Put them in any order you want, both are good and getting better.

"Nuria has been working a lot on her swing, and she's getting more comfortable with it all the time," Dailey said. "She has high expectations for herself -- she thinks 78 is an awful score. Maria gained 10 yards in driving distance from the fall, and her game is just getting stronger overall. They both have very solid games."

Beautell, the older of the two by eight months, grew up in a family of golfers. Her older brothers, Carlos and Patricio, both played college golf at Georgia Tech, and her older sister Sara also played.

"I just hung around with my brothers when I was very small, about 4 or 5 years old, and I started hitting some balls to pass the time," Beautell said. "And I just kept on going and started to play some tournaments. When I was 14 or 15, I started taking it all more seriously."

By 1998, Beautell's opponents had to get serious to compete with her. She won the Spanish national championship that year and joined Clau and Prieto in the European Team tournament. The squad qualified to compete at the World Championships in Chile that summer, but the trip was cancelled after the exile of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet made traveling a security risk.

Beautell has known since her brothers came to the United States to play that she wanted to follow in their footsteps. She found Dailey and Wake Forest through Prieto, and the decision was easy from there.

Clau's decision came later, and it was spurred by her desire to play golf while still furthering her academic studies to have a career outside of the game.

"We don't really have college sports in Spain, or anything like it," Clau said. "There's no way to do both sports and studies and keep up with both because there's no facilities or tutors to catch up on what you miss when you're at tournaments. The professors won't give makup work or makeup exams, so if people want to practice sports, they must do it on their own time."

Clau wasn't certain what she would do until Sara Beautell convinced her to come to America, and the Wake Forest connection kicked in again.

Clau loves the team play of college golf.

"Anytime I'm feeling down, I've learned to hang in there, because I'm not doing this just for me," Clau said. "Of course, I love competing. I'm kind of a safe player -- my drives are short, but they're pretty accurate."

With the arrival of the ACC Championships and then the NCAA Championships to follow after that, continued consistent play from the two freshmen is important to Dailey.

"It's a nice little connection we've built up in Spain," Dailey said. "They're nice people and bright students, and we're very fortunate to have them."