The IMG Junior Golf Tour was developed to fill a key niche in junior golf, the IMG Junior Golf Tour provides an elite setting for junior golfers to compete and gain exposure to college golf, professional golf, national junior rankings and athletic excellence.
Held in Florida every December, and open to boys and girls ages 11-18, the the IMG Academy Junior World Florida Challengeis a qualification and invitation only event featuring an international field of over 200 players.News
NJ Herald: NE Tour Championship Recap
Golf: Northeast's best junior golfers take on Ballyowen
STORY VIA NJ HERALD
HARDYSTON — The competitors were of diminutive in stature, but what they lacked in size they more than made up in pure bona fide skill.
The future of golf shined bright on Saturday and Sunday as Ballyowen Golf Club in Hardyston hosted some of the best golfers between age 11 and 18 as the site of the inaugural IMG Junior Golf Northeast Tour Championship.
Two picturesque days on the course produced enviable results, even for the low-handicapped amateur golfer.
Seventeen-year-old Bear Carlson, of Katonah, N.Y., took home the boys' 15 to 18 age division with a two-day total of five-over-par on Ballyowen's par-72 course, and Rina Jung, 16, of Briarcliff Manor, N.Y., finished the two rounds at two-over-par with a pair of rounds of 73 to wrap up the girls' 15 to 18 age division in impressive fashion.
In the younger ranks, 13-year-old Justin Mathew, of Rocky Hill, Conn., posted an 80.5 average over two days to clinch the boys' 11 to 14 age division, and Jersey City native Megha Ganne, 11, went 16-over-par in two days to secure a win in the girls 11 to 14 age division.
“(The Junior Golf Tour) is a good chance for kids to start to get their names into the national rankings and also earn performance-based entry status for the American Junior Golf Association,” IMG Junior Golf Tour Director Andrew Parr said. “It's a stepping stone, much like the Web.com Tour on the pro ranks.”
The older boys played from a shade inside the back tees, and the older girls teed it up more than 800 yards beyond the ladies' tees over the course of the round.
Toss in the fact that Ballyowen was a much different style golf course than what many of the kids were accustomed to, and the results were even more impressive.
The older boys' division field of 20 competitors averaged 80.2 over two rounds, the older girls had a mean score of 84.5, the younger boys' division posted a 84.7 average and younger girls averaged a score of 86 over two days.
“We always see some great golf,” Parr said. “Rina out there with two 73s on this course when it's windy, that's impressive any day of the week.
“It's great to see great scores and it's good experience for the kids to be out there and playing, even if they don't fair as well as they wanted to, it's a great learning experience in a competitive environment.”
The courses' landscape, bereft of even a handful of trees, showed its teeth in its usual way.
The wind made its presence felt.
On the tournament's final day Sunday, the flags went from dead on the pin to whirling in the steady breeze in an instant, forcing players to take into account every gust on each of their shots.
“This is a very different kind of a course than I'm used to,” Carlson said. “At home and most of the courses I play around, it's park land with trees and its not as windy. This is open, you can see everything, and naturally, it's much more windy. You just have to play a different kind of game and not hit the ball as high and just focus on hitting crisp shots every time.
Carlson entered the day with a three-stroke lead over the next two competitors with an even-par round of 72 on the tournament's opening day, but was tested down the stretch.
He shot three-over-par on the back nine to hold on and top Ryan Fitzsimmons, of North Haledon, N.J., by one stroke.
Carlson said the turning point was the ninth hole, the 423-yard downhill par-4, that he birdied to get a stroke back and gather some momentum heading into the final nine holes.
“It's obviously very windy and my ball-striking was on point, which is pretty key in these winds,” Carlson said. “You can't get going to far left or right in these winds because it'll kill you.”
Jung, meanwhile, carved up the course on the final day with added focus paid to her short game, at one point connecting on three birdies over a seven-hole stretch, to win the girls' title by a five-stroke margin.
“I practiced a lot beforehand because my putting wasn't working too well and I guess I was pretty lucky during the round, which was good,” Jung said.
The event was a good chance for Ballyowen to display its prowess as a premier golf course in the state and as a challenging setup for tournament events.
The uniqueness of Hamburg's links-style course brought a distinct ambience to IMG's inaugural Junior Northeast Tour Championship.
“We always look for quality golf courses as one of the main components to prepare kids for the next level, they need some good challenges, but we look for quality facilities and quality staff and we found that in Ballyowen,” Parr said.
