By Mikayla van Loon
The Victorian Junior Amatuer golfers had an eventful time while in Lilydale battling heat, lightning and thunderstorms but that didn’t make much difference to the tournament winners.
Victorian Jeneath Wong and Queenslander Manato Nakatani took home the Victorian Junior Amateur both with an impressive lead on their fellow golfers.
Wong had a stand out performance on day one seeing her score 11-under-par at Gardiners Run, while the boys battled it out for top spot all week.
After day two at Yering Meadows, the players were seeded and ranked accordingly, indicating who they played against on Thursday 27 January at The Eastern Golf Club and Friday 28 at Yering Meadows.
Wong held her lead throughout the tournament, scoring rounds of 70 at Yering Meadows, 68 at The Eastern and 71 at Yering Meadows which saw her notch up a 20-under par score and a 12-shot victory, her third in a row at the event.
It comes off the back of her victory at the Australian Master of the Amateurs two weeks ago and a runner-up finish at the Victorian Amateur in December.
Haruhi Nakatani finished second after her recent success winning the Tasmanian Junior Masters. Third place was filled by Molly McLean who finished with one-under par.
The boys competition was much closer in the leaderboard, with the Surfers Paradise member finishing at five-under par for the tournament, just one ahead of Hunter Gillard and Dujuan Snyman.
Nakatani gained a start at next month’s Vic Open in the process, while Wong had already qualified for the professional event at 13th Beach.
