|
Top players and administrators hailed for their acheivements, contributions and service. MIDLOTHIAN –– The trio of Scott Shingler (Haymarket), Vinny Giles (Richmond) and Mikey Moyers (Stanardsville) have garnered VSGA golfer of the year accolades as voted upon by the association’s championship committee and announced today at the VSGA’s annual meeting at Washington Golf and Country Club.
 Shingler was named golfer of the year for the first time, Giles was the recipient of senior golfer of the year accolades and Moyers garnered junior boy of the year honors.
Shingler, 37, finished second and was the low amateur at the SunTrust State Open of Virginia, held at Independence Golf Club this summer. His 14-under-par 274 aggregate at the SunTrust State Open was the lowest 72-hole total posted by an amateur since 1957 when amateur Tom Strange of Virginia Beach registered 274 in winning the event at Ocean View Golf Course in Norfolk. Additionally, Shingler finished second at the VSGA Mid-Amateur Championship. Shingler won the Evergreen Autumn Invitational, was third at the Amateur at International. The No. 2-ranked golfer in the VSGA player rankings throughout the season, he helped represent Virginia at the USGA Men’s State Team Championship, with his scores counting toward the team’s aggregate two of the three days.
 Giles continued to add to his legacy as the commonwealth’s premier amateur golfer in 2009 by winning the USGA Senior Amateur Championship. The central Virginian sank an 18-foot downhill putt at the 18th hole to defeat former Walker Cup teammate John Grace to take home the national championship title at Beverly Country Club in Chicago, Ill. In a memorable moment, when the ball tumbled in the cup, the 66-year-old winner of the 1972 U.S. Amateur provided a thundering fist pump and ran halfway around the putting surface before knocking on his putter's face twice. Giles, who has remained a lifelong amateur, joined William C. Campbell as the only players to have won a U.S. Amateur and USGA Senior Amateur title. Giles won the 1972 U.S. Amateur Championship at Charlotte (N.C.) Country Club in its last year as a 72-hole stroke play competition. Giles became the first Virginian to claim a USGA title in a championship open strictly to amateurs since he claimed the U.S. Amateur in 1972. Giles is also the only player in history to win the U.S. Amateur, British Amateur and USGA Senior Amateur. With his victory, Giles also set the record for most years between USGA titles of 37 years, eclipsing the old mark held by Bruce Fleisher, who had gone 33 years between U.S. Amateur (1968) and U.S. Senior Open (2001) victories.
 Moyers, 18, collected an unprecedented third VSGA Junior Match Play title in 2009. With the victory, he became only the second golfer to have his name on a VSGA junior title three times (Blackstone’s Cameron Yancey won the VSGA Junior in 1995 and claimed both the Junior Match and the Junior Amateur one year later.) In winning the Junior Match Play Championship, Moyers claimed four matches in two days and played a combined 37 holes leading up to the championship final, all while trying to shake off a cold.
Moyers also established the VSGA State Amateur Championship’s 36-hole stroke play qualifying scoring record of 12-under 132 at Cedar Point Country Club in Suffolk. Moyers’ to-par total was an event-best mark for 36-hole qualifying and he advanced to the second round of match play at the event. Moyers took home the Virginia High School League AA individual title in the fall. A longtime participant on the squad, Moyers helped the Virginias team to victory at the Virginias-Carolinas Junior Matches for its third-straight win in the series.
 Consistent with its history of recognizing ambassadors of the game, longtime VSGA staff member Jean Nichols was honored with the VSGA President’s Award in recognition of contributions and service to the game and the VSGA. Nichols, who is retiring from the VSGA’s full-time staff at the end of the year, joined the association’s then three-person staff in 1989 and has since helped the VSGA become one of the most active associations in the country. As the VSGA has grown during that time, she has been particularly instrumental in overseeing the budgets and finances not only of the VSGA, but also the VSGA Women’s Division, VSGA Foundation/Independence Golf Club and the VSGA Scholarship Program of the Virginia Golf Foundation. Nichols has also been at the forefront of coordinating VSGA activities related to its VSGA VIP Card Program, the scholarship program as well as personnel matters.
 The association presented its seventh VSGA Service to Golf award to Richmond’s Steve Isaacs, a longtime member of the VSGA board of directors. A Richmond resident, Isaacs served on the VSGA the board of directors for three successive four-year terms from 1997-2008. He developed and helped lead the SunTrust State Open of Virginia committee as well as helping the bylaws committee and tournament committee through his 12 years on the board. Isaacs continues to serve on the SunTrust State Open of Virginia committee. On the course, Isaacs began 2008 by taking the first two VSGA senior championships, the VSGA Senior Four-Ball and the VSGA Senior Stroke Play. He’s also won Richmond Golf Association events and other major invitationals in Virginia. An ardent supporter of William & Mary athletics, as a collegian, Isaacs started as the eighth man on the golf team and was No. 1 by the team he was a sophomore. He won the Virginia Intercollegiate Championship and was runner-up in the Southern Conference Championship.
Sectional chairman of the year honors went to longtime VSGA sectional chairman Mark Lange of Richmond. Responsible for assisting clubs in the Richmond South section of the association, Lange was instrumental in bringing services and support to VSGA member clubs as well as assisting and coordinating championships, zone and sectional qualifiers and other events. He promoted the benefits of the VSGA VIP Card Program, Rules of Golf workshops and the VSGA Handicap Program to clubs within his section.
 Richard Wight of Virginia Beach, Va., was elected to serve a two-year term as the 33rd president of the VSGA. Wight will lead the VSGA’s professional staff, committees and volunteers who serve more than 75,000 golfers in Virginia and over 300 member clubs in the commonwealth.
Wight began serving on the VSGA board of directors in 2001. He was later elected as the association’s secretary in 2005, he was treasurer in 2006-07 and served as vice president in 2008 prior to his election as president.
Wight began volunteering with the VSGA as a rules official in 1992. Today, Wight is a member of the U.S. Amateur Public Links Committee and works as a rules official at the national championship. In addition to regularly officiating VSGA championships throughout the Commonwealth, he is a rules official at the U.S. Senior Open, the U.S. Amateur and the NCAA championships. Wight is also co-chairman of the NCAA East Regional Golf Committee.
Wight says providing opportunities to the next generation of golfers will be a priority under his leadership.
“While strengthening the core fundamentals of the association, enhancing junior golf will continue to be a priority from the pee-wee to the junior golf to the college level,” Wight says. “We must remember that golf is a sport for a lifetime and requires discipline and dedication – the same attributes that will make one successful in life.
“The VSGA will continue to cast a wide net and bring the association to its member clubs.”
Professionally, Wight is president of Woodcrafters Inc., an established architectural millwork firm. Wight is a VSGA member at Princess Anne Country Club in Virginia Beach as well as Hermitage Country Club and Kinloch Golf Club in Manakin-Sabot. Wight and his wife of 41 years, Susan, reside in Virginia Beach.
Born and raised in Richmond, Wight graduated from the University of Virginia prior to serving a four-year stint in the Army as a Russian linguist for the Army Security Agency.
The other executive officers of the board are: E. Lee Coble of Richmond as vice president; Gib Palmer as secretary; Bruce Matson of Richmond as treasurer; Steve Smith of Arlington as past president; and Karl Quinn of Portsmouth as tournament chairman. Coble, Dr. David Kovach (Bluefield), Jan Sutherland (Danville), Terry Towler (Dillwyn) and Grover Walker (Great Falls) have been re-elected to serve a four-year term on the board of directors.
The aforementioned awards are in addition to the VSGA women’s division golfer of the year winners, which were announced last month at the VSGA Women’s Division Annual Meeting. The Women’s Division honorees were Whitney Neuhauser of Barboursville (women’s golfer of the year), Richmond’s Boodie McGurn and (senior women’s golfer of the year) and Amanda Steinhagen of Oak Hill (junior girl of the year).
The VSGA has grown from four founding clubs since its inception in 1904 to more than 300-plus today. Members of VSGA clubs and VIP cardholders total more than 80,000 individuals. The VSGA promotes and preserves the best interests of the game as embodied in its honorable traditions through its championships, administration of the USGA Handicap System, Course Rating System and Rules of Golf education, communications and VIP card. Furthermore, the VSGA oversees the Scholarship Program of the Virginia Golf Foundation and created the VSGA Foundation, which operates the Robins Junior Program and Independence Golf Club.
|
 |
