John Reay: Hundreds at funeral for golf 'pioneer'

John Reay "loved dealing with people", his manager said

More than 600 people have attended the funeral of a businessman and golf course owner who helped raise £3m for charity.

John Reay's friends and family gathered at Coventry Cathedral on Monday.

The 70-year-old was described by the Professional Golfers' Association (PGA) as a pioneer and innovator.

As well as transforming how golf equipment was sold, he designed a special golf glove for his son, who was born with a genetic defect.

Johnny Reay Jr has gone on to become an England international.

Johnny Reay Jr (left) said his father (right) was "a legend"

John Reay Sr turned professional at the age of 16, but it was his entrepreneurial approach that made the biggest impression on the game.

His manager Rob Challis said he had started out selling clubs "from what was nothing more than a cubby hole".

Yet Nicky Lumb, former captain of the PGA, said he had been "one of the first to have multiple shops", advertising equipment in golf magazines and local papers, which he said was a "totally new concept" at the time.

Mr Reay, who passed away following a short illness, was elected to PGA membership in 1971, six years after he left school at 14 to join Atherstone Golf Club in Warwickshire.

He later went to Nuneaton Golf Club before, at the age of 21, opening the John Reay Golf Centre in Sandpits Lane, Coventry, in 1972.

More than 600 people attended the funeral at Coventry Cathedral on Monday evening

Mr Lumb said his friend had also been a PGA tutor and "founder member of Europro Golf Centres - a buying group which had 20 franchised shops at its peak".

Johnny Reay Jr said his father's legacy was "massive".

"It was family come first before himself and that's what he did in his whole life. He put people before him," he said.

"He put charity, like his family, first. I was in Great Ormond Street [hospital] for my childhood life and we've raised over 250 thousand [pounds] just for Great Ormond Street."

Johnny Reay Jr, one of the country's leading disabled golfers, was born with Apert's Syndrome, a genetic defect leading to anomalies in the hands, feet and cranium.

He said when he was 18 his father had adapted a golf glove, adding a piece of velcro that allowed him to better grip a club, transforming his game.

Mr Challis said: "John was massively proud of Johnny for what he did, for his hard work that he put into the game.

"He was up at six in the morning, down at the club and that was John. He just loved dealing with people."

The golf centre was closed on Monday to allow staff to pay tribute to the Queen and attend the funeral of Mr Reay.