NFJG Tournament - The First Since COVID-19

AA played in the first NFJG Tournament since "sheltering at home" began in March. This two day tournament was played at Slammer and Squire (WGV). Ford said he could keep her safe, so all precautions are taken (mask and gloves in ladies restroom). There was many girls in the Elite Girls group, many Juniors and Seniors in High School.
Monday, Round 1: With Daisy Adams:

Ford said AA was on edge before the start of this tournament, mainly because it had been 8 weeks since she was in a competition. She did fine (two drives were less than good - one in the woods, one in the water, both to the right, she needs to really look at her club face each time), a score in the 70's from the white tees is a win for her!!

Day 2: (I was at work): AA played better by one stroke, finishing 3rd place with 11 over. She had one unlucky putt that stopped on the cup edge, - she would have tied for 2nd! With a 78 and a 77, she is consistently in the 70's from the white tees. Marvelous!!! She was briefly recognized by Kevin as he gave out the 1st (Ashley H. 16 years/2021) and 2nd place (Elizabeth K. 17 years/2021) trophies. AA was the youngest player at age 13.5 scoring better than 13 other players (one 18 year old, three 17 year old, three 16 year old, four 15 year old and two 14 year old). It was a great tournament with many excellent players to keep AA on her toes! Can't wait until she gets her new clubs, watch her scores go lower! Arriving home:

My tired girl golfer!

Scores:

Director Jack's Highlights (I added much more as this is the first since COVID19 sheltering at home began): 
The “World Golf Village-Slammer and Squire”, what better place to create history then to go to a venue that houses so much golf history as the “World Golf Village Hall of Fame”.  And what better place to host the re-start of junior golf in Florida and maybe the nation. What would all the golf greats have said in times like these? What would their reactions have been?  My guess pretty much the same. Protect the players and the spectators and practice good safety measures to insure everyone accomplishes their goals and get out there and play some golf. That’s what I’m talking about. It is time! Since near the start of the “Corona Virus Pandemic” golf has remained open with modified safety precautions.  Golf itself has been declared safe and healthy, not to mention a release from all the accumulative pressures related to the world fight against the “Invisible Enemy”.
People are practicing on the range and working on their short games, so with courses doing all this business my thought was why not get the North Florida Junior Golf Foundations Junior Tour re-energized again. The Foundation Board of Directors made up of top-notch PGA and area professional businessmen and women unanimously agreed golf was safe once we put “Social Distancing Guidelines” in place related to golf and that we did, setting what I think is a great model for other junior organizations to follow. 
In short, tee times were arranged as a single tee start with 10-minute intervals (two minutes longer than the normal tee time separation. To limit crowding players were restricted from coming to the course earlier than one hour prior to their tee times. Only twenty players were allowed on the driving range and 15 players on the putting green. The staff handing out all foods, drink and golf product with the protection of rubber gloves and enforced all policies put in place. One parent stated “It’s hard to believe there’s 115 players in the field because the place looked like a ghost town”. Meaning our plan of restricting arrival times had worked beautifully. We started tee times at 8:00 am and our last tee time was 2:40 pm. The final group in was clocked at 6:31.  If my math is right, I believe that is 3 hours and 51 minutes. Does 10 minute intervals really make the difference? Yes, I believe so, we also declared all wooded areas as penalty areas if a ball was lost and declared players could not return to the tee once they left the teeing ground. If a ball was found to be out of bounds, the ball was played from the nearest point to the fairway under general penalty. These restrictions avoided many back-ups and kept the pace of play going. USGA, we might want to rewrite a couple rules.
This week we added another division to the NFJG TOUR and division is a very welcome addition, as many of the players in the division are our past NFJG TOUR Alumni who are currently attending college or who have just recently graduated. With the college campuses closed it was suggested by UNF’s Cody Carroll and followed up by UNF’s (soon to be) Jason Duff that the NFJG Foundation should include players from local colleges to compete in a division of collegians on a space available basis. All I can say is it sounded like a great thing to do and the suggestion was turned into reality after another unanimous vote by the Foundation Board of Directors. Nine out of the twelve registered players in the St. John’s Open are past NFJG TOUR Players who are currently playing college golf.
In the Girls Overall Helena Rios (74) took a one stroke lead over Thanya Arasu (75) and Ashley Huffman (75) and would lead the Elite Division. Elizabeth Kondal would be two back at 76. Just a couple more back was Alyzabeth Morgan (78) breaking into her first round in the 70’s on the Girls Elite Tour.
Round two for the first round leader Rios would be troublesome and infested with double bogey-i-tis which lead to a 10 stroke difference from round one. Academy mates Ashley Huffman and Elizabeth Kondal would battle to the end with Huffman hanging on to a one stroke victory and the championship. Both players would post 78. Morgan would finish with an honorable mention third place with another great round in the 70’s at 77 just two shots back.