A British professional who helped spark the golf boom in Sweden 20 years ago is facing up to his toughest challenge yet – to convert Estonia to the game.
Peter Chamberlain has been dispatched by the PGA to an eastern European country which has only one golf course, no professionals and an empty budget.
But already the Birmingham-born’missionary’ is getting into the swing of his new role, to lay the teaching and coaching foundations, and has identified Estonia’s first professional.
As well as finding more low-handicap players to join aspiring pro 18-year-old Enrico Vilco, Chamberlain also hopes to attract newcomers to the game who were denied the opportunity to play under the communist regime.
Despite the lack of resources, Chamberlain, who coached Joakim Haeggman and Mats Lanner, remains upbeat about his challenge.
“It wasn’t much to go on. But not all that different from Sweden when I first took up a job there in 1967,” he said.