JGF unveils plans to introduce regional golf schools
The schools in all the six JGF regions across the country, will have their best players being trained to feed the national team with players
The Junior Golf Foundation tournaments are now averaging 140 players per tournament played across the country in a new spike of junior golfers embracing the sport.
JGF President Vincent Mukiri says they now have a dedicated pipeline that ensures the numbers are constant in all the tournaments. This is despite the national junior golf team being in camp all year round and missing some of the events.
Mukiri says the game plan from 2025 has changed and they are looking at a wide base of players away from the national team. JGF will now introduce regional golf schools. The schools in all the six JGF regions across the country, will have their best players being trained to feed the national team with players.
“What we will then see in another one or two years is a national team made up of members from across the regions and not just Nairobi as is the case right now,” explained Mukiri. “We are then seeing our national team members starting to go out there to colleges and follow up collegiate golf”, he added.
Mukiri observed that the international market is starting to look into Kenya and the juniors are getting the opportunities. The plan is to have a clear pathway in respect to when the junior players get to 18 and 21: where do they go to college for their golf, do they become pro golfers, or do they take up a career they love. The pathway is being refined continuously to ensure that no junior golfer “gets lost” and they are being channeled to colleges, universities, professional golf level and career golf level.
JGF is also strengthening the grassroots’ training at the regions. It involves coaches and teachers in all the regions, and the progress is now being measured objectively.
“We are looking at what has been done in training in two ways; first, we are requiring the coaches to start giving us objective reports that include the people they are coaching, the skill level they are at, and what the coaches think in terms of their development”, expounded Mukiri. “Secondly, we are developing a way of measuring the progress of our juniors; do we know which junior is in grade one in terms of skills, and we are coming up with a way of having every junior in our country knowing that this is the level that I am at.”
