Married for eight months, Boyd and Vasquez have been prominent on the Pro-Am circuit leaderboards throughout the Queensland swing, Vasquez the first woman to win a Pro-Am Series event in five years at Biloela last Saturday.

A Bowen Pro-Am victory is among Boyd’s seven top-five finishes dating back to late May and makes him one of the leading contenders heading into the $60,000 Ian Weigh Toyota Rockhampton Pro-Am, starting Wednesday at Rockhampton Golf Club.

Plans are in place to purchase a caravan and continue their nomadic start to married life for the next 18 months, the New South Wales pair taking full advantage of the unique opportunity that they have been afforded as professional golfers.

“We’ve found that balance of golf being this thing that allows us to travel the country,” said Boyd, the 2020 PGA National Trainee of the Year.

“We love Australia and we want to see it all. Whereas other people would have to quit their jobs to go and do that, we can sort of do both hand in hand.

“You have to be switched on when you get to the golf course, but you also need to switch off and our passion is camping and exploring and going and seeing things.

“We try and do that on our days off or make time to do things away from golf.”

Adds Vasquez, who became a full PGA Member on January 1: “We don’t really treat golf as a job.

“We’re not really that hard on ourselves because we know it’s golf that allows us to do what we love, which is travel around Australia.

“If it wasn’t for golf, we wouldn’t be able to do that.”

Boyd and Vasquez both played the Pro-Am Series last year to limited success, the pair struggling to adapt somewhat to their new environment.

But they are in their element now and believe that having each other for support gives them something of a competitive advantage.

“I see it through good mates and others. It is a big struggle being away for such long periods,” said Boyd.

“Whilst it’s hard for them, it’s also hard for the people at home.

“Sometimes things like relationships are put under stress because of the profession, whereas I’m not in that position, so I’m pretty lucky.”

In addition to having her hubby on hand, Vasquez has played the role of recruiter to bring fellow WPGA members into the Pro-Am fold.

Emma Ash was third at Biloela and the likes of Rhianna Lewis, Sarah Yamaki-Branch, Jordan O’Brien and Kelsey Bennett have all made starts throughout the Queensland stretch.

Their presence has been well received by the tournament hosts and fellow competitors and expanded the support network available to Vasquez.

“The others who have come this year are loving it, which is really good actually,” she said.

“I didn’t know how it would sit but they’re all for it, so I am really happy about that.

“Even the other day at Biloela, (joint winner) Anthony (Choat) was looking at the leaderboard and said to himself that if Danni birdies one of the last three and beats me, he’d be so happy for me, which is nice.

“He said if it was anyone else, he would hate it, but because it was me, he was very, very happy. So that made me feel a bit good.”

And as much as they are there to support each other, there remains a layer of competitiveness between husband and wife.

“We got paired together for the first time ever a few weeks ago and Darcy kept making birdie after birdie, so there’s definitely a competitiveness there,” Vasquez added.

That competitiveness comes with an incentive, too.

“The rule was that whoever has the worst score has to do the cleaning up, but it’s changed now,” Vasquez said.

“Between us we’ve got one motorised buggy and one old push buggy, so whoever has the best score gets the motorised buggy for the next event.”

“I’ve got to start playing better,” added Boyd, “because I’ve now got to push my buggy around Rockhampton for the next three days.”

Boyd has been drawn to play with Rhianna Lewis off the first tee at 11am on Wednesday while Vasquez will tee off alongside Harrison Wills from the 10th tee, also at 11am.

First groups are out at 6:50am.

Round 1 draw