On a high: Mirabel Ting and Jeneath Wong (right) after their breakthrough wins.
PETALING JAYA: Mirabel Ting has climbed to a career best top 20 spot in the women’s amateur golf rankings after winning the Valspar Augusta Invitational at Forest Hills Golf Club in Georgia recently. Representing Florida State University, the 18-year-old is now ranked 17th after finishing atop the 93-player leaderboard in the Augusta Invitational with a total aggregrate of seven-under 209.
The nation’s No. 1 women amateur put up a final round of five-under 67 to claim a two-shot win over Hannah Darling of the University of South Carolina, Loralie Cowart (University of Georgia) and Natacha Husted (University of Mississippi).
Both Darling and Husted are first-ranked women’s amateur golfers of Scotland and Denmark respectively.
It was a well-deserved victory for Mirabel after starting the year strongly with two seventh-place finishes at the Moon Golf Invitational in Florida and Collegiate Invitational at Guadalajara Country Club in Mexico.
“This is definitely another week to remember. Being able to come back to this event, it feels great,” said Mirabel on the University of Florida women’s golf website seminoles.com.
“This week, I did really well from tee to green and some putts dropped for me. The conditions out there were difficult but staying patient carried me to the win.’’
Mirabel previously claimed her maiden victory at the Moon Golf Invitational in February last year, then donning the Augusta University colours.
Also rejoicing in her first maiden win for her university is Jeneath Wong, who came out on top in the Silicon Valley Showcase in California last week.
Jeneath, a second-year student at Pepperdine University, shot a final round of 70 to finish the 54-hole contest on seven-under 206 at Green Hills Country Club.
Jeneath finished four shots ahead of Riana Mission from the University of San Francisco, who finished second after a closing 71.
Her breakthrough colleagiate win for Pepperdine University came just a week after she clinched a career-best runner-up finish at The Show at Spanish Trail in Las Vegas.
Jeneath is the second ranked Malaysian women amateur in 61st position.
