BEAT YOUR BOGEY HOLE WIN FOOTJOY SHOES

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The star factory Inside the coaching school that’s turning England’s promising young golfers into multiple tour winners WORDS ROB Mc GARR PICTURES ANGUS MURRAY, GETTY IMAGES Andy Sullivan Two European Tour wins already in 2015. Eddie Pepperell Challenge Tour winner and Top-100 golfer, making his Open debut this year. Danny Willett Two-time European Tour winner, ranked 36th in the world.
Chris Wood Two European Tour wins. Finished 5th as an amateur in 2008 Open, tiedthird a year later. he top-20 at this year’s Irish Open featured Danny Willett, Andy Sullivan, T Chris Wood, Eddie Pepperell, Matt Fitzpatrick and Tyrrell Hatton. Those players all have two things in common. One – they’re all English, part of a vanguard of new, homegrown stars who are taking over the mantle from the likes of Lee Westwood and Luke Donald. And two – they all benefited from England Golf coaching on their pathway from young prospect to Tour professional. The most notice the majority of amateur golfers will pay to England Golf is the small affiliation fee – usually around two per cent – added to your annual membership fee. This money goes towards things like organising your county championship and administering the handicap system. But England Golf also uses it, along with some National Lottery funding, to provide coaching to talented youngsters and turn them into future Tour pros and, with a little luck, the first English Major winner since Nick Faldo won the Masters in 1996. Wood, who recently won his second European Tour title, says: “Obviously we did a lot of work on our game, but there was also off-the-course training plus lots of travelling which educated us on what was needed and how to be strong enough for life on tour when we turned pro. “The sort of opportunities I had to play around the world just wouldn’t have been available if I hadn’t broken into the English teams and got that support. When you understand how important being in the England set-up was you can appreciate how desperate I was to get in it.” “National coaching really took off in 2001,” says Stephen Burnett, performance manager for England Golf. “There were obviously still English golfers doing well before then, but it’s a completely different world out there now with all the other countries really investing in golf coaching.” In a world where sport is big business and one home-grown Major winner can change the future of a sport, England cannot afford to rely on chance to deliver world-beaters when other countries are investing millions in spotting and nurturing young talent. “There aren’t many golfers that have gone on to the Tour in the last few years that haven’t come through the programme in some respect,” says Burnett. Nowadays, a structured programme invites applications from promising teenagers, the best of whom are invited to attend a ➔
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BEAT YOUR BOGEY HOLE WIN FOOTJOY SHOES

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