St Joseph’s Alumni who not only won the KGS Captain’s Alumni Golf tournament but also the best dressed team award. — Photo courtesy of KGS
KUCHING: St Joseph School Alumni recently won for the seventh time the KGS Captain’s Alumni Golf tournament, the unique and only inter-alumni competition in Sarawak organised by Kelab Golf Sarawak (KGS) since 2006.
Led by captain Dr David Sylvester Ling Sheng Tee who is also KGS captain, St Joseph scored 1,492 points to beat defending champions St Thomas by 12 points, the tightest margin of victory in the competition’s history.
In third and fourth place were Tanjong Lobang and Sacred Heart respectively.
The Josephians also walked away with the best dressed team award, finishing ahead of Sacred Heart School Alumni, Tanjong Lobang School Alumni and St Thomas School Alumni.
St Thomas claimed the team gross title when Abu Bakar Kiprawi, Wan Liz Farwana, Waili Abang, Jimmy Teo, Lim Lian Heng and Joseph Lau returned a total score of 497 strokes.
In the individual contests, Bill Lu Thian Taek was the nett champion as he carded a 67 score, followed by Mulok Saban with a 71 and a stroke further back was Mohamad Arafat.
The individual gross category saw Abu Bakar Kiprawi returning a score of 78 to beat Wan Liz Farwana by three strokes and Waili Abang by four strokes.
KGS Captain’s Alumni Golf’s new patron Minister of Tourism, Arts, Culture, Youth and Sports, Datuk Abdul Karim Rahman Hamzah, who spoke at the closing ceremony, said he was pleased with what he had seen and experienced on that day.
“From what I can see today, four different school alumni are having fun together in a golf game that is being held annually. With this kind of comradeship, I am very very happy to be the patron of this event.
“Looking at how you all get together and be so happy this way, this is unlike most of the other programmes that I have been to. It’s so good to see everybody being happy this way,” said Karim.
He also announced an annual grant of RM20,000 for the tournament.
The Asajaya assemblyman suggested that the organiser expand the tournament by inviting other school alumni to join the event as well as seeking successful people from the four school alumni to come forward and support it so that the participants can get better prizes.
This year’s theme for the tournament was “Fostering fellowship beyond rivalries”.
Tournament chairman Mazlan Mohd Salleh said the tournament served as a good platform to bring the old boys together and renew old rivalries in a friendly way.
“This is the only game that alumni play against each other in the country.
“On behalf of KGS, I would like to thank the minister (Karim) for agreeing to be the new patron of this event and also to former patron Tan Sri William Mawan Ikom who has supported this event since 2006,” he added.