Every golf club would appreciate that simply instituting a grassroots program of this nature, be it to encourage junior development or a membership drive, has no iron-clad guarantee of success. Not everyone who starts in the game, remains in the game long-term or even remain at the same club if they do.

With such programs, it can be a case of ‘rinse and repeat’ each year, often with limited returns on the investment of time and resources. Sometimes, any success achieved can come down to pure luck.

At the Wollongong Golf Club on the NSW South Coast, the fruits of the persistent efforts of many during the past decade on the junior development front have been bearing some amazing fruit in recent years – with ‘luck’ playing very little part in the process.

Supported by the club’s professional staff along with the generosity, commitment and support of the membership and local business, the club’s thriving junior program is a shining star in the Illawarra region. Dozens of boys and girls, many of whom are now hovering around scratch handicaps, are now fully invested in the game they might not have given a moment’s thought to even a year or two ago.

“This has been building for several years and the support of the members and funding we’ve received has helped a lot,” Director of Golf Operations, Greg Kerr, said.

“Club member Paul Fenton (Fenton and Associates) deserves special mention as he’s provided funding for the advanced program for ten years and we have had generous corporate support which goes directly into tuition, mind coaching and weekly functional movement classes to work on their agility and strength.

“We’re trying to expose them to the mental and physical side of the game, how to manage their time and nutrition between rounds and to get them to realise golf is more than just hitting a little white ball around.

“We’ve had a good team of professionals here over that time too. Aaron Keevers and Jack Kessell have been spearheads of the program and we’ve got five or six kids now that are being picked up by other clubs like Pymble, Bonnie Doon, Concord and The Australian.

“We consider we’ve done our job if we’ve gotten them to the stage where they can go on to bigger things if they choose.”

RIGHT: Wollongong women's champion, Lara Thomsen, who claimed the 2022 title by 41 shots. PHOTO: GolfPlus Media.

Bigger things do seem to be on the immediate horizon for squad member Lara Thomsen, who last year at age 14, won her third-successive club championship at Wollongong in addition to the women’s championship at The Australian Golf Club, where she now holds a golf scholarship.

Had both events featured on-course scoreboards, they would have been plastered with red numbers given the hot hand the plus-two marker brought to each tournament.

At Wollongong, Thomsen shot a course record 66 in the final round to finish seven-under par for 54 holes, good enough for a 41-shot margin of victory. At The Australian, Thomsen won in a high calibre final and was an amazing seven-under par through 35 holes when she claimed the title.

Thomsen’s rise to prominence has recently been rewarded with selection in the NSW squad to contest the 2023 Australian Junior Interstate Teams Matches in Tasmania in April. Outstanding results by any standard, for a girl who like many of her peers was ‘knee high to a grasshopper’ when they started in the program at Wollongong before their 10th birthdays.

Thomsen’s younger sister, Mimi, would most likely have finished runner-up to Lara at Wollongong had she not fallen ill midway through the championship. At just 13, Mimi is another making her family and the golf club proud with her development in the game and currently plays of two handicap.

Men's champion, Sam Cascio, in action. PHOTO: GolfPlus Media.

The final rounds of the 2022 men’s club championship pitted the leader, 14-year-old Sam Cascio and two of his junior squad mates, alongside club legend Chris Barrett in the final group. A former professional and state representative, Barrett appears on the honour board at Wollongong more times than anyone else in the club’s history – which is saying something given the quality names who have graced the fairways at Wollongong over the years – in addition to those at many other clubs in the region where he has won tournaments.  

He was no doubt keen to add to that legacy but on this occasion, youth would prevail with Cascio admitting the experience – taking the lead with rounds of 69-69, having a week’s break to sweat on the lead, then the ebbs and flows between the leading group during the final round – was nerve wracking but ‘cool’ at the same time.

Barrett as expected was magnanimous in defeat, quipping that the combined ages of his three playing partners that day didn’t come close to his own.

The club has a history of young players achieving success when you consider Cascio was not the youngest club champion on the men’s side in their long history. Brad McIntosh – still the only player to shoot 59 in a PGA Tour of Australasia event – retains that mark from winning his first of three championships at age 13.

On Cascio’s side however is that he’s the youngest ‘home-grown’ club champion, a mere seven years after he took up the game through the junior program.

Just turned 15, Cascio also plays off plus-two and has started to receive additional coaching and guidance from PGA professional Warwick Dews, who is based out of the NSW Golf Club. Like Thomsen before him, Cascio had some tough decisions to make recently with a host of scholarship offers at prestigious Sydney clubs to choose from.

It’s a point of pride for the club and Kerr’s staff that between both Thomsen and Cascio, the combined age of Wollongong’s 2022 club championships is just 29 – an achievement that surely few clubs in Australia, if any, can compare with?

And it’s not just their club champions the members are excited to see literally growing before their eyes as players and people.

Others like Lara and Mimi’s brother, Alex, Zac Oysten and Coopar Nianios are among a gaggle that take to the course several times a week, honing their skills for hours on the chipping and putting green and beginning to dip their toes into junior and open competitions across the state.

A team featuring Mimi Thomsen, Samarah Gibson, Charlie Kerr, Tom Tugrul, Harry Egerton and Oysten were NSW state finalists in the 2022 Encouragement Shield while both Cascio and Thomsen played in their first Australian Amateur Championship in Sydney in January, with Oysten soaking up the experience ‘inside the ropes’ as Cascio’s caddie.

Such is the enthusiasm of youth, both were back at Wollongong playing and practicing with their friends in the afternoon following the completion of the second round. 

Watching on, a smile wasn’t far from Kerr’s face and he’s quick to highlight the importance of ‘keeping it fun’ and family support play as bedrocks to the success of any junior program.

“If the parents are actively involved and down here with them, that really helps. A lot of the kids we have lost have been those where the parents aren’t members and don’t play,” Kerr said.

Come and try programs have proven popular. PHOTO: GolfPlus Media.

And while a stigma still exists among this age cohort about the attraction of golf when compared to more mainstream sports like AFL, rugby league, netball and soccer, a focus of the club’s marketing efforts has been an attempt to break down these barriers with their annual ‘Come and Try Free Day’, encouraging those interested to bring a friend along too.

“If the kids are interested in continuing, we get them into the MyGolf program which involves three to four classes a week to learn the game. They have a five-hole on-course experience on Saturday afternoons and can then join the club proper at that point,” Kerr said.

“They love getting on the course and that’s the key at that age and stage, to keep it as fun as you can and reward them along the way.”

A multi-faceted junior program now fully embedded as part of the club’s fabric says much of the inclusivity of the culture of the Wollongong Golf Club and its members, with reports that many others are also keen to join the club when space allows to be part of the action.

Whether a conveyor belt of future champions continues to emanate from the program or not seems immaterial when you see the grins when a first par is pencilled on the card or when they receive their first handicap.

Even the simple joy of watching kids enjoying an ice cream together, excitedly telling tales of the shots they played after a session on the golf course, suggests the club’s efforts to introduce young people to the game is all worthwhile.