“Did you know, young golfers?”
– 17 October, 2024 | Text & Photo Isobel Costa Owens
Today is the anniversary of the very first official golf tournament in the world, which took place, one hundred and sixty four years ago, in 1860, at the Prestwick Golf Club in Ayrshire Scotland.
This tournament is credited as being the birthplace of organized competitive golf and it is the world’s oldest continuously running golf tournament. It became the British Open and golf’s most revered and historic competition.
The tournament was created to determine who the best golfer was after the death of Allan Robertson, who was regarded as the best golfer at the time.
Eight top professional golfers from around the country participated and Willie Park Sr. won by just two strokes. He was awarded the Challenge Belt, a red Moroccan leather belt with silver clasps which was later replaced by the Claret Jug trophy, still in use today. By 1873 amateurs could also compete.
The modern game of golf may have developed from the Roman game ‘Paganica’ that involved using a bent stick to hit a leather ball.
In ancient China they also played a game called ‘Chuiwan’ where a stick was used to hit a ball into a hole in the ground.
Another theory is that the game developed from Scottish shepherds who entertained themselves by hitting rocks with sticks, but what is certain, is that golf is now a multibillion dollar industry.
Initially, golf was deemed unsuitable for women to play despite the fact that Mary Queen of Scots was an avid player in the 16th century. She introduced the sport to France and it is thought that the origin of the term ‘caddy’ comes from the French military ‘cadets’ who carried her clubs.
However, it was only, over three hundred years later, that women were allowed to officially play, when the Ladies Club was introduced at St Andrews in 1867.
Did you know that it was a woman, named Issette Pearson, who, in 1893, invented the handicap system to make the game fairer for mixed skilled players to compete against each other?
The Algarve is one of Europe’s leading golf destinations renowned for its scenic golf courses situated along coastal cliffs, in scented pine forests and amongst rolling hills.
The first golf course built in the Algarve was ‘The Penina’, now called the ‘Sir Henry Cotton Championship Course’, in 1966.
Today there are forty two courses catering for both beginners and professionals.
Golf has traditionally been seen as a sport for the wealthy, due to the exclusivity of some clubs, the equipment costs and the green fees. So, when I had my children back in Gillingham in England, I never thought that one day they would be young golfers playing on the Algarve’s prestigious courses.
My son started playing aged just four and my daughter six and every Saturday morning we would go to the Pestana Golf Academy in Lagoa. They enjoyed it and their golf outfits and sets of proper small golf clubs were really cute. They also took part in tournaments organized by the Portuguese Golf Federation playing across the Algarve against children from all over the country. This meant that we got to know most of the Algarve towns and golf courses as their father and I acted as their caddies. It was exciting when they played well and especially if they won, but if they lost, they always took things in their stride and each amassed a nice collection of trophies over the years.
Introducing young children to any sport is highly beneficial as it can contribute to their physical, mental, and emotional development.
In the Algarve’s they have the opportunity to play a sport that is not so available in other regions and some club programmes aim to make the sport more accessible to future generations of golfers.
Golf can aid a child’s coordination and motor skills while they have fun. The swinging of the club and walking the course helps to develop muscles, endurance and strength. The young golfers also have to learn to think logically and problem-solve as they work out the distance and the club size needed for a specific shot.
The tournaments help to build their confidence and self-esteem teaching them the social skills of cooperation, patience, discipline and sportsmanship because although golf is an individual sport, it is also a game of etiquette. There was one occasion when we had to let the then President of Portugal, Anibal António Cavaco Silva play through on the Salgados course!
Although my children gave up golf when they were older, football, tennis, golf and dancing took up a lot of their childhood. They formed friendships with peers from diverse backgrounds and became part of the local community.
However, whilst golf plays a major role in the Algarve’s economy and I am glad we were part of the ‘scene’ for a little while, there are also detrimental economic, environmental and social impacts of there being so many courses in such a small region.
Perhaps the most controversial impact is the vast amount of water needed to maintain the fairways and greens so green, as the Algarve suffers from severe droughts and our dams often operate at their lowest capacity. Also the chemicals used to keep the courses healthy may seep into the ground water and harm local wildlife. Each time a new course is built the biodiversity is reduced through the destruction of flora and fauna even if the many golf course lakes go a little way to provide a new style habitat.
There is also the urbanization which takes over land at the expense of what used to be historical, cultural or agricultural areas. The luxury golf resorts are aimed at the wealthy, pushing up house prices, goods and services which negatively impact the local populations and those not involved in the golf industry.
There has to be a balance between the economic advantages to the region whilst ensuring that our Algarve retains some of the original charm and communities that made it so attractive in the first place.
I feel privileged and thankful that my children grew up in an area that afforded them so many sporting opportunities.
These experiences helped to shape them into the independent, confident, well balanced individuals who still lead an active sporty life today and who use, in their daily lives, the valuable social skills learnt so many years ago.
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