England international Tom Lewis (Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire) has won the Silver Medal for The Open Championship’s best amateur player finishing three shots ahead of Peter Uihlein from the USA.
The 20 year old former British and English Boys Champion found himself at the top of the leaderboard at the end of the first round alongside Denmark’s Thomas Bjorn after returning a five under par score. He then continued to battle through some of the worst weather conditions seen at an Open Championship with rounds of 74, 76 and 74 to record a nine over par total of 289.
Tom has been a member of the mainstream coaching programme of the English Golf Union (EGU) since 2008 when he was selected to join the under 18 Squad before moving to the elite England squad in 2009 and 2010. He has represented his country in the 2010 Eisenhower Trophy, European Mens Team Championships and the Home Internationals and as an England Boy International at the 2009 World Boys Team Championship and in 2008 and 2009 at the European Boys Team Championship and Boys Home Internationals.
John Petrie, EGU Chief Executive said, “We are all really proud of Tom and his achievements this week at the Open. We hope that the experiences and coaching he has received through the EGU has played a positive part in developing and encouraging a golfer who clearly has a great career ahead of him.”
This was not the first professional experience for Tom. In December 2010, as part of an EGU squad sent to Australia for warm weather training, Tom starred in two professional events again winning the silver medal as leading amateur in the New South Wales Open, in which he lost a playoff for the title, and the Australian Open.
The last English amateur to win the Silver Medal was Chris Wood, another ‘graduate’ of the EGU’s coaching programme, who came joint fifth in 2008 at Royal Birkdale
English Golf Union www.englishgolfunion.org