Teen golfer makes history for Vietnam at Asia-Pacific tournament

By Quoc Huy   October 30, 2023 | 01:10 am PT
Teen golfer makes history for Vietnam at Asia-Pacific tournament
Nguyen Anh Minh leaves the course after finishing the final stage of the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship in Australia on Oct. 29, 2023. Photo by Bach Cuong Khang
Nguyen Anh Minh is the first Vietnamese golfter in history to make the top 10 of the prestigious Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship (APAC) in Australia.

Since its establishment in 2009, each APAC tournament had at least one Vietnamese participant. The best result was the T46 position of Truong Chi Quan in 2016. However, Minh broke that record and peaked at T7 this year with a final score of +6 after four rounds at the Royal Melbourne par71 in Australia.

In the final stage on Sunday, Minh started with a score of +7 but was down to +11 after the ninth hole. But he made an astounding comeback in the next nine holes with five birdies.

This is Minh's second APAC tournament. Last year, the 16-year-old finished at T48 with a score of +9, with the tournament taking place at the Amata Spring Country Club in Chonburi, Thailand.

To find the champion this year, the three golfers in T1 including Australia’s Jasper Stubbs and two Chinese Wenyi Ding and Sampson Yunhe Zheng had to play an extra stage.

Ding was eliminated in the first round after scoring a par while the other two had birdies. In the second round, Zheng scored a bogey while Stubb held par to win the tournament, along with qualification to two major tournaments next year – the Masters and The Open.

Two other Vietnamese golfers participated in the 2023 APAC. Le Khanh Hung finished at T24 while Doan Uy couldn't make it past the second stage.

APAC is organized by the Asia-Pacific Golf Confederation for amateur golfers in the region and is currently sponsored by two major organizations – the Augusta National in Georgia, the U.S. (Masters) and the Royal & Ancient in Scotland (The Open).

 
 
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