In the past five years or so, Singapore golf at the biennial South-east Asia Games has reached a highly prominent position.
From mere also-rans for more than 20 years, Singapore's men golfers have worked themselves into gold-medal contention – thanks to the foresight of the Singapore Golf Association which had tweaked its approach with a professional outlook.
A restructuring in training with national coach Matt Ballard, a high-performance set-up that catered to taking the game to new heights and a huge investment in time and resources saw the local men's golf hit lofty heights.
In 2017, the team of Gregory Foo, Joshua Shou, Marc Ong and Joshua Ho struck gold by beating perennial favourites Thailand in a play-off after both sides were tied at the end of the match-play competition.
And in 2019, history was made when James Leow hit pay dirt with a one-shot victory over Thailand's hot favourite Tanapat Pichaikool after overcoming an overnight two-shot deficit to win by one stroke at the Luisita Golf and Country Club in the Philippines.
It was Singapore's first individual gold medal after 30 years, following Samson Gimson's triumph at the 1989 SEA Games in Kuala Lumpur.
So with the defence of the historic title coming up in May in Vietnam – following last year's postponement of the Games and other major events because of the Covid-19 pandemic – 2022 has turned out to be a very busy year for the SGA.
Six major international tournaments have been slated for the year and the SEA Games feature highly at the Heron Lake Golf Course in Hanoi.
The Heron golf course is a memorable venue for Singapore after the nation's Putra Cup team claimed both the individual and team golds at the Putra Cup in 2019.
Singapore will be represented by Ryan Ang, Justin Kuk, Hiroshi Tai and Wong Qi Wen (men) and Aloysa Atienza, Hailey Loh and Inez Ng (women).
Said Ang: "I'm looking forward to flying the Singapore flag high and getting the best result we can from the Games. The next few weeks will be spent on tidying up various aspects of my game to best prepare for the challenge in Hanoi."
The Asian Games in Hangzhou, China, in September and the Nomura Cup, the dates and venue for which will be announced soon, are two other notable events for Singapore.
Other major events to look out for are the World Amateur Team Championships in Aug-Sept in Paris for the Eisenhower Trophy (men) and Espirito Santo Trophy (women).
To cap the busy year ahead, the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship and the Women's Amateur Asia-Pacific, the dates and venues for which have not been decided yet, are tournaments to look out for.
Coach Ballard will be focusing on training the Singapore golfers for these events with the help of newly appointed assistant national coach Joshua Shou. The SGA has also engaged strength and conditioning coaches as well as a psychology coach for the golfers.
Shou, who starts on April 1, will also focus on the training of juniors to ensure a sustainable pipeline of golfers in the coming years. In a bid to boost junior golf development, the association recently formed a junior development committee which comprises one representative from each golf club in Singapore, chaired by SGA executive board member and Keppel Club captain Ng Luo Yi.
The SGA has selected 40 juniors between the ages of 6 to 12 as part of its Future Squad. SGA will continue to organise on-course competitions and ranking games which will count towards the junior Order of Merit for spots in the SGA Junior Squad.
Dylan Chua won the January event and Annika Chui claimed the February honours in the SGA-Mandai Junior Golf Series, held every Wednesday for 6-12 year olds.
SGA and corporate partner Lexus will award a customised headcover to the "Junior Golfer of the Month" who records the lowest gross score each month.
Other events for juniors are the SGA Junior Golf Challenge Series, SGA Junior Golf Day and the HSBC Youth Golf Challenge.
