Ballito golfer Olivia Wood sweeps titles at KZN championships
A double KZN title win, and a 20-shot Namibian victory set the stage for her American dream.
Ballito’s Olivia Wood (19) is in the golfing form of her life after claiming a double win at the provincial championships.
She fought off some top-quality competition to win both the match play and stroke play titles at the KwaZulu-Natal Ladies Golf Association Championships at Victoria Country Club in Pietermaritzburg last week.
Photo: GolfRSA.
That momentum was spurred by a dominant win at the Southern Regional All Africa Challenge at Windhoek Country Club in Namibia earlier this month. Facing off against golfers from five southern African countries, Olivia shot rounds of 71, 71 and 73 to finish on one under par, a stunning 20 shots ahead of the second place finisher!
“I’m feeling good about my game at the moment and it feels great to get a few wins in a row,” she said.
“I came second eight times over the past two years so it’s really cool to have finished strong recently.”
Photo: Roger Sedres/GolfRSA.
Olivia has several tournaments to look forward to across the country over the next few months, before leaving for American collegiate golf in August. She earned a scholarship to the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, where she will have an opportunity to play with promising amateur golfers from around the globe.
“I’m just working as hard as I can to keep my game in the best shape possible before heading to college,” she said.
“I will be studying health and exercise science. I really enjoy the gym training side of sport and I think it will be a good fit.”
Olivia was first introduced to golf as a young girl by her dad, also a regular golfer. After joining him at the range for a few years, she took her first lesson at seven years old, but initially only enjoyed it as a hobby.
“We moved to Ballito when I was nine and it was still just for fun, but I really started taking it seriously when I started boarding at St Mary’s for high school,” she said.
Although a talented sportswoman in other codes, Olivia made the decision to focus on golf completely from the age of 16 and now practises almost every day. She is a member of Umhlali Country Club but also lives on and regularly plays at Simbithi Country Club.
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