SINGAPORE – At 5am on April 16, sisters Jaymie, 19, and Denise Ng, 16, woke up in the same room to prepare for their 7.18am tee time at Laguna National Golf Resort Club.
They had no idea then that their dreams were going to be separated by two feet.
It had promised to be an enthralling final round of the 36-hole National School Games (NSG) Golf Championships after both Jaymie and Denise, competing in the A Division girls’ category, were neck and neck after the opening round on April 15.
The siblings, who represented Singapore Sports School (SSP), both shot two-under 70 to finish three shots clear of schoolmate Jillian Kuk.
But dark clouds loomed and with the lightning warning system activated, play was abandoned at about 10am on April 16 after the sisters hit just two shots on the first hole.
The winner was determined on countback based on the 18th-hole tiebreaker, as the sisters shared the same cumulative score from holes 10 to 18, 13 to 18 and 16 to 18.
Jaymie, who birdied the 18th, was crowned champion for the third consecutive year in the girls’ A Division category. Denise had bogeyed the same hole when she missed a two-foot putt.
Jaymie, who mixed five birdies and three bogeys, said the win did not come easy due to ongoing swing changes which affected her distance control.
She added: “I’m very happy to win the NSG title again but, at the same time, I am disappointed that I wasn’t able to fight it out with Denise. It was anybody’s game.
“We’ve never competed one-on-one in an actual tournament before with both of us in contention. We really wanted to play today.”
Younger sister Denise was annoyed after missing the short putt on the 18th which would have clinched her the title.
She said: “It was a bad mistake... I was pretty angry but I just brushed it off. I guess I was a bit nervous at that point because I didn’t have a bogey yet.”
But she will take comfort in an improved showing from the B Division competition in 2023, when she finished fourth after shooting 11-over 155.
Just a week ago on the same course, Denise had won the Singapore Junior Development Tour’s Ranking Series 2 event to earn her first points on the World Amateur Golf Ranking.
In the other girls’ events, Chen Xingtong’s four-under 68 first-round score was enough to clinch the B Division title by a shot from SSP schoolmate Chloe Ng.
St Joseph’s Institution International’s Sydnie Ng won the C Division title on countback after she was tied with Singapore Chinese Girls’ School’s Annika Chui on three-over 75.
In the boys’ categories, SSP’s Aaron Wee and Raffles Institution’s Ryan Ong both shot 71 with the former winning the A Division title on countback.
Troy Storm of Anglo-Chinese School (Independent) carded a 70 to win the B Division by five shots, while schoolmate Reddy Vihaan (73) prevailed in the C Division by the same margin.
