For the past three seasons, the First Tee program at the Tumwater, Wash., golf course has averaged 400 youth participants. The club now offers a weekly Junior Golf League, PGA Junior League, the Valley Golf Academy for player development, and the O Bee Junior Open Golf Tournament.
Several years after the Olympia, Wash., area’s original First Tee Junior Golf program was discontinued, Tumwater Valley Golf Course (TVGC) in Tumwater, Wash., has stepped in to fill that void, and for the past three seasons their First Tee program has averaged a 400 youth participants, the Thurston (Wash.) Talk reported.
TVGC has been creative in meeting the increasing junior golf demand with offerings such as a weekly Junior Golf League in spring and summer and a PGA Junior League—structured similarly to youth baseball leagues complete with coaches, team matches, and “all-stars.” Additionally, the Valley Golf Academy (VGA) was established in 2016 in an effort to help players looking to grow their game and successfully compete at the high school level and beyond, the Talk reported.
“After establishing The First Tee Program at Tumwater Valley, we realized the need to complement our existing youth offerings with a player development program,” said Russ Olsen, VGA Founder. “We now have a complete junior instructional package that caters to all juniors and ability levels.”
From there it seemed a natural progression for Olsen to feed all of these junior offerings into the O Bee Junior Open Golf Tournament, bringing kids together in one competition that is tailored to a wide range of ages and talent levels, the Talk reported.
“We offer a variety of divisions of play,” Olsen said. “We cater to those who will be experiencing tournament play for the first time with our three-hole division, to the intermediate players competing in the nine-hole division, on up to the best high school players in the state battling head to head for the 18-hole title.”
This year’s O Bee Junior Open tournament will take place on April 23. All youth who register before April 9 will receive a custom logoed Titleist Sack Pack. Titleist will also be on site giving away sleeves of nearly every type of Titleist ball, including ProV1’s, the Talk reported.
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