The 2019 Alaska Junior Golf State Championship, featuring two rounds of competition in six age categories, opened play on Tuesday, August 6th at the Birch Ridge Golf Course.
Junior golfers in the younger divisions: Girls 10 & under, Boys 9 & under, Girls 11-13 and Boys 10-12, play two nine-hole rounds over two days; while the Girls 14-18 and Boys 13-15 age groups play 18-hole rounds over two days at Birch Ridge Golf Course.
First Round leaders by division include:
Girls 10 & under Cierra Stuyvesant 61
Boys 9 & under Clayton Cooper & Colton Dreyer 52
Girls 11-13 Kaira Deland 55
Boys 10-12 Josh Cowan 41
Girls 14-18 Elizabeth Kim 81
Boys 13-15 Shane Sundberg 81 2018 Boys 13-15 champion (two-day 177)
(photo courtesy of birch ridge golf course facebook page)
Competition continues on Wednesday with the final rounds of the Alaska Junior Golf Championships.
The course record is an -8 under par 62 recorded on 8/21/09 by Aaron Dexheimer, a playing Pro who played junior golf on the Birch Ridge Golf Course.
2018 Alaska Junior Golf Championships report
Reprinted from August 7, 2018
Local golfers from Soldotna and Kenai, most affiliated with the Birch Ridge Golf Course, dominated age group competition at the 2018 Alaska Junior Golf Association State Championships held in Anchorage.
The AJGA state championships were contested over two days with day one at the Anchorage Golf Course and day two at Moose Run Golf Course.
Results include local golfers in age group categories.
Boys Age 7-9 9 holes forward tees
1st Place State Champion Adam Coghill: Day 1 42 Day 2 40 Total 82
4th Place Clayton Cooper: Day 1 60 Day 2 55 Total 115
Girls Age 11-13 9 holes red tees
1st Place State Champion Keely Sundberg: Day 1 58 Day 2 63 Total 121
2nd Place Tait Cooper Day 1 61 Day 2 63 Total 124
3rd Place Evelyn Cooper Day 1 67 Day two 67 Total 129
Boys Age 13-15 white tees 18 holes
1st Place State Champion Shane Sundberg: Day one 45, 47 for a 92 Day two 43, 42 for an 85 Total 177
2nd Place Jakob Brown: Day one 40, 45 for an 85 Day two 58, 46 for a 104 Total 189
Girls Age 16-18 red tees 18 holes
2nd Place Danica Schmidt: Day one 47,48 for a 95 Day two 49, 49 for a 98 Total 193
Tait Cooper (from Kenai and playing for Birch Ridge) recorded a hole-in-one on hole number 6, a 108 yard par three; only the second hole-in-one in an AJGA event. Shane Sundberg was the first with a hole-in-one in 2017; Tait is the youngest to hit one in AJGA event at 11-years-old.
