Bogart — The first thing you notice about Kevin Hall is his lightning-fast fingers. He can absolutely wear out a keyboard, whether it is on his ever-present BlackBerry or any laptop that's nearby.

Deaf, Hall often communicates by typing. He can talk, but it's difficult for anyone other than his father and mother to understand him. So when Hall wants to communicate, he bangs out about 100 words or so a minute and shows the screen to whomever he's talking to.

This is the way Hall conducts an interview on the eve of the Athens Regional Foundation Classic golf tournament. The reporter asks questions. Hall reads the reporter's lips. If he can't make out the question, he turns to his father, who signs it back to him. Then Hall, fingers comfortably on the home row of the reporter's laptop, rips off a couple of sentences at a speed close to what it would take someone to say it.

Rat-a-tat-tat-tat, rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat.

Next question.

Hall has been figuring out how to answer questions in one way or another since he was 2 years old. That's when his parents, Percy and Jackie, learned that H-Flu meningitis had taken their son's hearing.

"We could tell he was losing his hearing even before they told us and started doing all the tests," said Percy Hall, who accompanies his son on all his golf travels outside their native Cincinnati. "He already had a pretty good language base at that point. So, yes, it was devastating. But it was better than the alternative. [The meningitis] could have taken his life."

Hall is one of four sponsor's exemptions amid 156 players competing this week in the third annual Nationwide Tournament event at Jennings Mill.

There are many more recognizable and accomplished names than Hall in this year's tournament, but he says he is not here to provide a feel-good story for the sponsors. He intends to win.

"I believe I can because of my past success here," said Hall, who shot 14 under par to take medalist honors in a first-stage, PGA Tour qualifier here in 2005. "It is a course that rewards players who keep the ball in play and on the proper level on the greens, and I think that plays right into my game."

That's the thing about Hall that sometimes is forgotten — he can play.

He won the Big Ten tournament by 10 shots his senior year. Tee to green, the 25-year-old is one of the best ball strikers on tour.

"Hardest-working kid I've ever been around," said Jim Brown, Ohio State's golf coach. "And the guy never had a bad day while he was here. He wants to play on the PGA Tour, and he's going to do whatever it takes to get there."

Hall's parents are the reason for that. After getting over the initial shock of their son's disability, they decided to raise him with the belief that he can do anything that anybody else can do. And Hall has done that academically and athletically.

The son of a bowling coach, Hall took up that sport first and achieved a No. 2-national ranking in his age group by the age of 8.

A year later, one of his father's friends introduced him to golf. He finished second in the first tournament he entered at age 10 and won his first national junior tournament at 14. By his senior year, he was considered the best player in Cincinnati.

After graduating as valedictorian of his class at Winton Woods High, Hall accepted an academic and athletic scholarship to Ohio State.

He's been surprising folks ever since.

"My goal is to try and make it to the PGA Tour and compete against the best players on a daily basis," Hall said. "But ultimately, I want to be the best I can be in golf for myself and to be able to influence other people through golf in any way I can."