Jennian Homes Waikato Winter Strokeplay

17th July 2007

Listed among the 124 players
to play the first two rounds of the Jennian Homes Waikato
Winter Classic are two of the country's finest players to come out of the Titleist Academy.

Both will be kick starting their careers at Lochiel after relatively quiet times for different reasons and either in any sort of their best tournament form could streak this field.

Sam Hunt, Rotorua, 23 in two weeks time and Riki Kauika, 23 at the end of the year have won the best of NZGA staged 72 hole events earlier in their careers.

But neither have been playing tournament golf seriously as other things in their lives took precedence.

Sam Hunt has successfully completed his Bachelor of Science degree at the University of Las Vegas as a result of a golf scholarship he was awarded. The efforts he has placed in his scholastic activities at the expense of his golf were recognised last month named one of three
Mountain West Conference
scholar athletes as a senior.

To be eligible for selection as a MWC Scholar-Athlete, student-athletes must have completed at least two academic terms at the member institution, while maintaining a cumulative grade point average of 3.5 or better, and have participated in varsity competition for their athletic team.

Hunt's 3.55 in kinesiological science earnt him that honour, the other two players Matt Kinsinger and Johnny Pinjuv
earnt theirs in journalism / media studies and finance respectively.

A New Zealand Strokeplay
Amateur Champion and World
Secondary Schools top individual two years in a row, Hunt has followed advice he received from USPGA legend Fred Couples to the letter.

Couples was at Kauri Cliffs to play Michael Campbell in a TV
produced matchplay round and an introduction for Sam to meet him was arranged.

During a discussion, Couples, speaking from his own experience advised the Rotorua teenager, then undecided in his career moves to get the best education qualifications he could achieve first and put his golf game on hold.

There would be plenty of time to play golf at the highest level later as he would be only 22 when he completed his college graduation, and he would always have something to fall back on if golf was not his passion then.

But a college education would always prove advantageous when in a decisive moment in a professional tournament having the proven thought processes required to weigh up options under pressure, Hunt was told.

A Golfing Graduate

But the academic achievement acquired, its time now to tackle a golfing career in earnest and he is relishing the opportunity to be able to focus on his golf at Lochiel. He will be based at home in the immediate future with his supportive parents, and is playing tournaments at Lochiel, Whakatane and Rotorua in the next four weeks to get his swing and game back in order. He's hoping to play the GTNZ event at Titirangi and hoping to qualify for the NZ Open as options to start a professional career.

He sees the two Nationwide Tour events in Australasia
as future options to qualify in, as many of the Americans on tour are not happy to travel such distances to play.

Riki Kauika, one of the brightest prospects when spotted as an
10 year old by Wanganui
professional Craig Owen playing at the nine hole Tawhero Course
fulfilled that potential in his teenage
years.

Winning NZGA 72 hole events he was an automatic selection in the youngest New Zealand team selected for the World Championships held in 2004 in Peurto Rico.

But for the past three years since Kauika has played little tournament golf as he got his life back in order. It followed a horrendous year, 2004 that promised so much for him when selected in the New Zealand team. But an immature offensive prank among the team, one night when playing a tournament alongside Brad Iles and Kevin Chun in Malysia was recorded and texted far and wide.

The circumstances were badly handled, widely reported and it has taken a long time for the quiet man to overcome that
and the subsequent performance at the World Championships.

Josh Geary having won
the Waikato Winter Strokeplay outstandingly was selected in the injured Ile's place and finished fifth in the individual order was the only one of the team to fire to his capabilities.

Last year Kauika played in several of the big
summer amateur tournaments in the USA, but his heart was not in it, having not been named in the unstructured Titleist Academy for the first time in many years.

" Perhaps I had been bored with
all the tournament golf and travel.
I love golf, I love to play it. It's awesome. Maybe because I've been playing in all these New Zealand tournaments for so long, I've become bored with them."
he said at the time.

Last year he had returned to play pennants golf for his Tawhero club alongside brothers Jamie and Sam to get the club into A division of the Manawatu - Wanganui competition.





.

But although he does not hold out any particular time frame or goal, Kauika is simply aiming to play to the same high standard he set back then and take what rewards that will bring.

He still has a deep passion for the game and is still determined to test himself at the highest level. He spends as many as seven days a week on the fantastic Belmont course in Wanganui, working alongside the Course Superintendent Barry Shannon as a greenkeeper.

He has played pennants golf only in the interim but has undertaken a fitness program to ready himself for a conscientious effort to return to the top of amateur golf.

But the time he had available for golf practise he had in Wellington while working alongside Mal Tongue is simply not there nowadays.

The prospect of a professional career at this time is some way off, he says, but he will take every opportunity that opens.

In the next few months he intends playing every major 72 hole tournament available to him.
It commences with the Waikato Winter Strokeplay this weekend, at Lochiel, a course he played superbly on some years ago as a Manawatu Wanganui representative in the North Island Junior Interprovincials but would hardly recognise the superb new developments that have taken place there in recent times.

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