Anna Wu had to battle more than just her closest opponents to win the B.C. Juvenile (U17) Championship at Arbutus Ridge Golf Club in Cobble Hill. The 14-year-old Victoria resident also had to convince herself she could do it.
“I think the thing I am most proud of is that I believed in myself,” Wu said, then adding with a laugh, “I wasn’t thinking, oh no, I can’t do this. I am going to die.”
Wu didn’t just win, she won big. A three-under 69 in the final round gave her a five-shot win over Lilian Zhao of Port Moody. It sounds easy, but it wasn’t. For starters, Wu had to come from behind. She began the final round one shot behind Zhao. Wu had pulled even through seven holes, but the momentum swung big time on the par 4 eighth hole, where she holed a wedge from 72 yards for an eagle.
That shot gave her a two-shot lead and Wu never looked back. “That was kind of a surprise,” she said of the eagle. “I just teed off as usual and used my 54-degree wedge for my second shot. It just flew through the air, landed right beside the hole and bounced in.”
Wu is heading into Grade 9 at Royal Bay Secondary and is a junior member at Royal Colwood Golf Club. She had a simple game plan at Arbutus Ridge that could best be summed up this way: hit the ball hard and stay out of your own way.
“My game plan was just to hit it as hard as I could and not get in any hazards,” she said. “And I didn’t hit into any hazards today. Yeah!” A hot putter helped in the final round. “My putting was so much better than it was the first and second day,” she said.
Anna Wu Poses With Her Proud Granparents - Image Credit Una Chou/BC Golf
As her lead grew on the back nine, Wu tried not to dwell on the cushion she had built. “Honestly, I was just trying to tell myself that I didn’t have a very big lead,” she said. “I was telling myself I just had a one- or two-shot lead. I didn’t want to let myself get into this nervous state.”
Wu knew par was her friend on the back nine, where she made seven of them as well as one birdie and one bogey. Zhao, meanwhile, struggled on the backside and the tournament was pretty much over when she made three bogeys in a four-hole stretch midway through her back nine.
Wu finished the tournament at three-over par. Zhao, who shot a final-round 75, finished at eight-over, while Victoria’s Emma Kral was third at nine-over after closing with an even-par 72. Joanna Kim of Langley and Vivian Zhao of Port Moody tied for fourth at 13-over.
“This means a lot,” Wu said of becoming a B.C. champion. “My hard work paid off. This is a perfect way to end the summer. I love it. I hadn’t won a single championship this entire summer.”
Wu, who came to Victoria from China several years ago, was introduced to the game by her grandfather. He walked every step of the way with her at Arbutus Ridge. “My grandpa got me into it, so I am pretty grateful for him,” she said. “He helped me calm my nerves and helped me focus on what I should do and not let my brain float off into the wilderness.”
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CHIP SHOT: Juvenile Boys champion Luke Bernakevitch and fellow Victoria resident Emma Kral combined to win the two-person better ball competition that was also held at Arbutus Ridge. Their score of 20-under par was two shots better than the runner-up teams of Jack and Jenny Guo of West Vancouver and Jaden August of Pitt Meadows and Tyson Valk of North Vancouver. . . A 36-hole Zone competition concluded Wednesday with the Zone 4 team of Jenny and Jack Guo and Jeevyn Lotay of Burnaby winning with a score of three-under par.