QUINT VAN BEEK RETURNS FROM THE R&A JUNIOR OPEN 2012

06/08/2012

Young Quint van Beek was among the 122 juniors from 68 nations that last month descended to the Fairhaven Golf Club at Lytham St Annes to compete in the 10th Junior Open Golf championship organised by the R&A.

Quint registered scores of 90 and 85 on the par 74 course which plays just over 7000 yards and is littered with 130 deep bunkers. Quint’s main adversary, however, was to be Fairhaven’s deep rough which made itself more difficult due to it being wet.

Introduced in typical championship fashion "This is game number 24. On the tee from Malta, Quint van Beek" Quint managed to control his nerves and, on a dark grey cloudy afternoon, started with a decent drive which finished in the first cut on the right.

A double and a triple bogey – due to a lost ball - on the par five’s 15th and 16th hole maximised the damage on this first day of play. A disappointed Quint walked off the course to be greeted by an R&A official who allowed his flight to take a picture with the Claret Jug – the trophy that is presented to the winner of The Open championship.

Starting early on the second day, Quint first tee shot was even better than the previous day splitting the fairway 275 yards down. He played his first nine holes one over par for the course but then succumbed again to the rough on the back nine. With an aggregate of 27 over par for the two rounds, Quint finished joint 88.

The R&A Junior Open was won by Asuka Kashiwabara, a 16-year-old from Miyazaki, Japan who scored a historic win with a winning margin of 14 strokes at the end of 54 holes which was also a record for the tournament. Asuka broke Fairhaven’s women course record with a first-round of 66 which she duly followed with two more sub-par rounds of 69 and 71 for an astonishing grand total of 16 under par 206 for the tournament.

Accompanied by his mother, Quint was able to be presented his player’s badge by the 2011 Open Champion Darren Clarke and later in that week was able to watch at The Open Championship that at Lytham and St Annes that was dramatically won by Ernie Els from Adam Scott.