Davenport junior Ryan Tenbrink is a key member of the men's golf team and utilizes his background in boxing to help with his success on the course. He grew up on a family farm in Wright, Mich., which is a short drive from Grand Rapids, and went to school at Kenowa Hills. In his four years of high school at Kenowa Hills, he was All-Conference four times and All-State his junior and senior year on the golf team. Here at DU, he is averaging an 18-hole score of 78 and his best has been a 69. Last year as a sophomore, he also made the GLIAC All-Academic Excellence team. As a student, he is studying accounting fraud investigation and is interested in auditing. He currently works at Spendmend as an auditor and wants to continue that route after graduating. He also mentioned there were some companies already in contact with him about full-time positions after graduation. 
 
Q: What careers are you interested in after graduation from DU?
A: The plan is to go into auditing, which is what I'm doing right now. I'm an associate at Spendmend currently and we audit hospitals. I do all the research, look through invoices, collect statements, and call people all day long. I also worked for another company and after graduation they want me to come and talk to them about being a part of their accounting team. I have some options but I would like to stay in the auditing field.
 
Q: How has competitive boxing helped with your success on the DU golf team?
A: Growing up, fighting was always kind of an interest for me. I was a black belt growing up, but really started competitively fighting two years ago. It really gives you that competitive advantage being an individual sport like golf. You're playing for yourself just like you're playing for your score in golf. Obviously you have your team, but you're playing for yourself. It was kind of something that came natural to me. I like doing things by myself so these two things were of interest to me. I go to the gym as well to mess around and spar, but I also have my own set up at my house. To be honest, now it's kind of a thing to help me stay in shape, and I wanted to be able to defend myself if needed. It's been a lot of fun, you obviously don't get as many breaks as you do in golf, but I've been enjoying it. The mental game with boxing and golf are very similar too so it really comes down to not letting the game beat you because these two sports are very capable of doing just that.
 
Q: What is one takeaway from being raised on a family farm that has helped you become who you are today?
A: My family is actually one of the only centennial farms in Michigan, so over 150 years on the same land. I grew up in the little town of Wright, and in eighth grade graduated with only four others. But I was raised with the hard work, no-excuses type of family. All of my great-grandparents and grandparents farmed and I was always there growing up. My mother grew up poor with the family farm and my father grew up in a family with some money, so I've been able to see both perspectives and I'm grateful to have been experiencing it. My grandparents also paid me to help out with the farm, so that made me stick around quite a bit more. Getting to learn all the different cultures that come with farming as well has been really cool, along with learning how to drive big tractors and other cool equipment. But my dad now runs an apple packing company which provides housing for the workers. It has been cool to kind of see and connect with people from different cultures.



Story by: Ben Huttenga