Profiling David Moura’s contribution to golf in Portugal
David Moura has significantly influenced Portuguese golf and his potential was spotted as a 12 year old at Pinhal Golf, Vilamoura. “For 5 euros per month, I had teaching from great coaches like Joaquim Sequeira and for only 25 euros a month children today can also join Vilamoura.” David became a Physical Sport Teacher Educational in 2003, a professional golfer in 2004 and later gained the TPI (Titleist Performance Institutional) Junior Golf Certificate. He was assistant coach to the Portuguese National squad and physical coach to Ricardo Santos the first Portuguese player on the European Tour. In 2013 the PGF (Portuguese Golf Federation) appointed David as Junior Golf Development Programme Manager as he recalls. “Less than 90 schools and 1500 children being involved was unsatisfactory. Pupils and teachers were interested and clubs wanted juniors but there was no communication.”
Project Drive then received financial support and David Moura acknowledges the impact of this contribution from the R&A, European Tour, Portugal Masters and Ryder Cup Trust. “We developed manuals for teachers and booklets for children and parents attending the road shows and the communication problem was being properly addressed.” With the TriGolf scheme involving schools, clubs and councils a develop ment framework took shape. Primary schools were targeted as a feature of Project Drive’s policy of supporting young children to try golf. Project Drive is very successful and 42 road shows have attracted one and a half million people since 2013. Nearly one thousand adults and 65,000 children have also tried golf and already David Moura is targeting “20,000 more children”. With clubs donating equipment and some even planning their own roadshows David is highly optimistic.
“It’s great that the PGF works with schools and clubs and companies like Travel4golf who provide support.” David is also proud of successful Portuguese golfers like Ricardo Santos and Ricardo M Gouveia. “Progress is really encouraging and with hopefully two Portuguese on the ‘Tour in 2016 our juniors will be inspired even more.” Present and future generations of Portuguese golfers will be greatly indebted to David Moura while he remains in the background working steadily to take golf in Portugal to the next, even higher, level of achievement.