Knox County's Parks and Recreaction opened the door to a whole new sport for the disabled Saturday.
A new specialized golf cart allows people with physical handicaps to play golf on Knox County's three public courses.
Parks and Rec Director Doug Bataille saw the cart featured for wounded warriors. As soon as he met 15-year-old Alec Ratliff, who lost both his legs to a flesh eating bacteria, he knew they needed one here.
Alec recently added golf to his list of hobbies at a rehab camp but found it limiting in his chair.
"When I first tried it, I enjoyed it a lot but I wanted to go out into the field [course] and hit it from there. It would be quite hard to roll in it in my wheelchair," Ratliff said.
The new cart solves that problem for Alec and others with disabilities.
A grant funded golf cart allows Alec to ride around the course on the cart, then stay in his seat and swivel around to hit the ball.
"Providing this kind of opportunity is sometimes a challenge to think about how do we do it, what do we need. So this is a great opportunity to be able to provide this," said Bataille.
"We want to make sure everybody has an equal opportunity to enjoy what we have," said Knox County Mayor Tim Burchett.
A quick call for reservation allows anyone to take it out for the day. The county's veterans services and seniors services are also letting people know.
"We'll probably have to get a few more of these carts I suspect," said Mayor Burchett.
The mayor may be right because Alec plans on using it a lot.
"I'll probably try to come every Sunday after church," said Ratliff.
"For him to be able to experience golf is just awesome," said Alec's mom, Cloie.
The cart can be used at any of the three Knox County Golf Courses.