Anthony Barkley
Welcome to my first article on golf for golfers.
For those who don't know me, I am the PGA professional at the Rotorua Golf Club.
Like all of you reading, I love golf and am excited to bring you the latest golfing news.
We have four playing professionals who live or lived in Rotorua.
We have Danny Lee on the PGA tour battling away to secure his card for next year. He just needs one tournament where he fires for all four rounds and he is capable of winning.
We have Peter Lee, who is playing the lesser tours, but I believe he has huge potential to do well.
We also have Victor Janin, who is playing mainly the New Zealand professional events as a stepping stone to bigger things.
Bradley Iles is an example of a great golfer still finding his feet as a professional after many years.
It's a tough old life waiting for that breakthrough tournament but we all hope things click for him soon.
Rotorua does well to produce so many quality golfers and credit must be given to the development of juniors by schools such as Rotorua Boys' High.
I'm lucky enough to be coach at the school and feel these academy or golf option type school programmes are valuable in not only creating quality players, but also in growing the numbers playing the game.
They also provide a great tool in teaching lifelong traits which start at club-based junior programmes.
One of my roles as a PGA Professional is to grow junior golf so I will talk more on this topic in future articles but for now, if you have a youngster interested in golf, get them to a club-run programme.
Who knows, they may become the next star.
Jahche Broughton beat tourist Karen Aim to death with a baseball bat when he was just 14.