New golf pro series tees off at Ellesmere College for the first time

A junior golf tour series will begin at a prestigious school in Shropshire next year - the first time it’s been held at a school.

Three annual European Junior Golf Tour events will be held at Ellesmere College in April, June and September - having previously only been held at private clubs in its 21-year history.

The decision to begin a new series at the college came through a link between Ellesmere College Golf Academy Coach Rob Ashbrook and professional junior golf coach, and tour founder director Roger Shutt.

An inaugural competition was held at the college last month and Roger said it was a huge successm“We had almost 50 people tee off at Ellesmere College on September 12 and we had nothing but good feedback. It was so easy to run, they opened all the doors for us, we had the course to ourselves and the players all had positive feedback about the course.

“It is the start of a strong bond between Ellesmere College and the European Junior Golf Tour - in fact, one of my students I teach has decided to become a pupil at Ellesmere College because they were so impressed by the Golf Academy, they are moving up from London for that sole reason!

“It has sparked my creative imagination and I'm very excited to build the event and 2022 series into an annual relationship.”

The next event due to be held at Easter looks set to double in size with both a morning and afternoon session.

The junior tour will also put on a family fun day with chipping, long drive and target challenges for players and families as well as an indoor golf simulator and family pairs competitions, such as parent and child playing together.

The sessions are part of around 30 events the Tour stages each year, which attract players from all over Europe as well as Thailand, Finland, USA, Canada and Russia.

The Tour series provides junior golf tournaments on a nationwide and international basis for children aged from five to 17 years old. Many young players who compete have since gone on to become Tour Professionals ranked in the Top 25 in the World Rankings.

Stephen Mullock, Deputy Head External Relations at Ellesmere College, said: “We were thrilled when Rob and Roger said the College would be a perfect location for one of the legs of the European Junior Golf Tour. The inaugural event was a huge success and we were delighted to be able to host such talent and see the professionalism from the junior golfers who attended.

“We are so pleased to be able to offer our state-of-the-art facilities in order to help golf stars of the future to develop and improve, something we are dedicated to through the growing success of our Golf Academy.”

The series at Ellesmere College will be official qualifiers for the world invitational champions 2022 in Ireland and the European Junior Tour ‘Race2Spain’ order of merit points.

The overall winner of the series will also gain a scholarship to study at the College alongside their golf training.

For more information on the Ellesmere College Golf Academy please visit https://www.ellesmere.com/the-schools/all/clubs-an....