The first annual Friends of TLPGA Open tees off this week at the Gold Coast Golf and Country Club in New Taipei, Taiwan. 84 pros and 7 local amateurs, gathering from Thailand, Malaysia, Japan, and all around Taiwan, will be vying for a NT$540,000 top prize in the NT$3 million TLPGA Tour event.

The “Friends of TLPGA” was founded two years ago by a group of golf-loving, local entrepreneurs. They believe that stronger competitions and successful local players on the global scene would play a key role in arising the interest among sports fans and young athletes, which are critical for the growth of the golf sport in Taiwan. “We had this idea in 2021, when the pandemic struck badly in Taiwan. People are forced to be kept isolated physically, and we felt that we really needed to bring up something positive, to keep the hearts united and connected,” said Huang J-C., who was the key man behind the plan.

“We came from many places, but we have just one goal, to help the ladies to pursue higher in their golf career and to stimulate the development of golf in Taiwan. So yeah, the best support we could offer is probably to help the players to be financially better off so they can get the quality of training they hope for,” said Huang. “We arranged a three-year based sponsorship program, to give 30 TLPGA players direct financial aid on a monthly basis, through the donation of 50 ‘Friends of the TLPGA’ when it first started. It has now just progressed into the final year of the program, and I am very happy to have received so many unexpected messages from many more friends that they hope to lend a helping hand. Now we’ve got 70 members in this program and I’m trying my best at the moment to extend this program into the second three-year period starting from 2024. Hopefully we can leverage our resources into supporting not just pro members but also the junior players.”

“In fact, for most of us who are currently not with a very high ranking, we are never quite financially stable because our income depends solely on our prize money. We appreciate what the TLPGA has done for us in giving us a place to compete for a living, but a cash support on a regular basis is just hugely helpful and important for us to really be able to concentrate on improving our game, instead of needing to worry about how we cover all the expenses,” said TLPGA member Wu Hsiao-Ling (吳曉玲), who is one of the 30 players benefitted from the first “Friends of TLPGA” sponsorship program. “I feel really thankful for Friends of TLPGA.”

With the international players returning onto the TLPGA Tour and cutting the playing opportunities for the local players, Friends of TLPGA decided to collect an additional fund to facilitate the organization of a new TLPGA tournament, before it has all come together so soon, thanks to the help of the 70 members, as we witness the inaugural “Friends of TLPGA Open” this week.

Last week’s Island Resort Championship (a co-sanctioned event by the LPGA’s Epson Tour and the TLPGA Tour) winner Tseng Tsai-Ching (曾彩晴) and all other TLPGA members playing in Harris, United States, did not register for this week’s event in New Taipei, except for Julian Hung (洪玉霖). It provides a great chance for breakthrough for some new up-and-coming young names in the top-tier TLPGA Tour showdown.

This marks the first time since 2016 the TLPGA Tour travels back to the New Taipei’s Gold Coast Golf and Country Club. Two hole-in-one prizes will be up for grabs on Hope No.11 and No.15.