Leading golf charity the Golf Foundation has formed a valuable link with two key events in the national golf diary, in order to further support juniors in golf clubs and raise its fundraising profile in the golf club network.
The Golf Foundation has become the Official Nominated National Charity of the Junior Team Golf Home Nations Championship and the Golden Golf Celebrity/Amateur Charity Tour, two significant competitions for amateur golfers who love the game.
Junior Team Golf is a growing competition where teams of boys and girls compete at club, regional, and national level, before a Grand Final at La Manga Club in Spain. The competition is open to thousands of players, and organisers believe the association with the Golf Foundation will help create additional credibility for Junior Team Golf and further raise the event’s profile.
The Golf Foundation is a charity committed to the sporting and social development of young people through golf. Working with the national golf partnerships, a key part of its work is to create greater accessibility to club golf for youngsters. The Foundation’s link with Junior Team Golf is designed to help raise awareness for the importance of creating more junior players to protect the future of the game.
The Golden Golf tour teed off in 2007 and was born out of the Sir Steve Redgrave Golden Five Tour, which contributed substantially to the sporting icon raising more than £5 million for children’s charities over five years. The Golden Golf tour’s overriding objective remains to raise money for children’s charities and to offer great fun while doing this to a field of amateur players from UK golf clubs and a list of celebrities that includes Gavin Hastings, Darren Gough, Rachel Heyhoe-Flint, Alex Hay, Gareth Edwards, Kriss Akabusi and Steve Redgrave himself.
As Official Nominated National Charity, the Golf Foundation will be allocated a team of playing places in each of this year’s six order of merit Golden Golf tour tournaments, which take place at well-known golf venues in the UK and abroad. The places will be used as significant auction items at Golf Foundation public events, which traditionally present excellent fundraising opportunities for the charity.
Mike Round, chief executive of the Golf Foundation, said, “Junior Team Golf is clearly an exciting event for youngsters and we are delighted to be associated with junior activity of this nature, similarly we welcome the association with Golden Golf. Raising our profile in golf clubs is essential for our fundraising efforts and the additional funding of both these events will be used to help clubs with their school outreach programmes, which is a central part of our strategy for encouraging youngsters from all backgrounds and abilities to play the game.”
Helen Tarttelin, Junior Team Golf championship director, said: “Junior Team Golf is a unique event, designed to give teams of mixed handicap players the chance of representing their country in an international final. We are proud to be supporting the Golf Foundation and, by so doing, helping youngsters into the game and taking their first steps towards achieving a handicap and hopefully a life-long interest in the game; possibly even one day aspiring to play in the Junior Team Golf Home Nations Final.”
Junior Team Golf www.juniorteamgolf.org
Golf Foundation www.golf-foundation.org