How some of Australia’s top golfers are ensuring future generations of up-and-coming talent have the same opportunities, if not more. 

Australia is often seen as the envy of the world. The lucky country. And it is – even if such sentiments perhaps ignore our real estate prices, or isolation from the rest of the world in the business and geographical sense. Australia is indeed a marvellous place to live, and a world leader in identifying elite golfers from a talent pool that is tiny relative to the rest of the world. In other words, Australia punches well above its weight in professional golf.

But how? What has allowed Australia – whose population of 26 million is only marginally bigger than the sum of Los Angeles and San Diego (23 million) – to produce, during the past dozen years: the 150th Open Champion at St Andrews (Cameron Smith); a two-time major winner (Minjee Lee); an historic Masters winner (Adam Scott), two PGA champions in the men’s and women’s game (Jason Day and Hannah Green); and two world No.1s (Scott and Day)?

The answer is several factors. Perhaps most importantly, it’s reasonably good access to every tier of public and private golf courses. We are also an athletic nation and, every now and then, the stars align to redirect a talented young boy or girl away from swimming, cricket, soccer, Aussie rules, rugby league or basketball and into the great game of golf. The national rules, amateur and elite pathways body, Golf Australia, also plays a significant role in nurturing emerging talent.

Yet the glue that binds it all together is a mentality among the men and women tour pros, who have enjoyed success on the world stage, that replenishing what they took out of the national body, and from the game in general, is the right thing to do.

The Adam Scott Foundation does wonderful things in the space of education and charity, while other pros like Lucas Herbert, and LPGA stars Lee and Green, have donated money directly back to Golf Australia through its “Give Back” program. Then there are icons like Smith and seven-time major winner Karrie Webb, who have arranged for their contributions back to the national program to be structured as annual scholarships that they have taken the reins on. The dividends are astounding, and unlike anything in the world of golf.

Cameron Smith

On vibes alone, Smith’s program is perhaps the funniest. About the time of his maiden PGA Tour win in 2017, the Brisbanite wanted to give back to Golf Queensland. So he created an annual junior scholarship for elite Australian amateurs that sees two winners receive an all-expenses-paid trip to Smith’s house in Ponte Vedra, Florida, for a week of golf and mentoring as well as attending a tournament with him. Smith came through the Queensland Academy of Sport and the high-performance programs of Golf Queensland and Golf Australia.

The inaugural Smith Scholarship winners were Louis Dobbelaar and Jed Morgan. In 2018, the pair travelled to the US and, the day after landing, were out on the golf course. Smith suggested a 72-hole bet to the boys for the week and offered them a 10-shot head start. The games of golf were at exquisite and private clubs in the Ponte Vedra/Atlantic Beach area – Pablo Creek, Atlantic Beach Country Club and two games at the famous TPC Sawgrass, where Smith would only five years later win the Players Championship. Dobbelaar opened with a 72 and Morgan a 73, but Smith struck the ball beautifully en route to a 63. Morgan and Dobbelaar had wasted almost all their strokes on the first day. Dobbelaar recalls through laughter: “We were nervous to justify our scholarships, and Cam looked us in the face and said, ‘I didn’t realise they’d sent over the Queensland B team.’”

Dobbelaar and Morgan thought it was hilarious. They spent the week learning in a boot camp-style program with lots of laughs, a bit of sledging, plenty of practice and information that helped them join the paid ranks.

Smith’s scholarship represents the 2022 Open champion’s cheeky sense of humour and approach to giving back. And it’s not just laughs, the Smith Scholarship is producing serious results. Both Dobbelaar and Morgan turned pro. Only three years after the scholarship, Morgan won the 2021 Australian PGA Championship by 11 shots and secured DP World Tour status. He later joined Smith for a season on his Ripper GC side once Smith had moved to LIV Golf.

Morgan and Dobbelaar aren’t the only two golfers who have been inspired by the inside knowledge they gained from Smith. The list of scholarship recipients who have turned pro also includes Elvis Smylie and Jeffrey Guan, while several recipients will soon take the leap from elite amateur to pro.

In 2023, the program expanded beyond Queensland juniors/amateurs to become an Australia-wide scholarship, and Smith has also stepped up the pro tournaments he takes recipients to. Last year, Guan and West Australian Joseph Buttress attended the US Open at Los Angeles Country Club, having flown to California on a private jet with Smith, and they walked inside the ropes with him during a practice round he played with Adam Scott and Xander Schauffele.

Smith’s reasoning for creating the scholarship shows a genuine care for the future of Australian golf. “When I first came to the US, I really had no one else around the same age as me who I could relate to and have a beer with,” Smith has told Australian Golf Digest in the past. “I wanted to be someone Aussie juniors could talk to. I love watching the juniors play golf because they play with such freedom. As PGA Tour players, sometimes you’re so worried about the outcome of shots, you forget to be a kid. But it’s just golf, not the end of the world.”

When combined with the fact Smith will play in this summer’s Queensland PGA, New South Wales Open and Australian PGA, it’s easy to see where the boy from Brendale in Brisbane’s northern suburbs gives back to the country and game he loves.

Karrie Webb

When Australian icon Webb began her golf journey as a child in Ayr in North Queensland in the early 1980s, she would write to the editors of Australia’s golf magazines and request they start publishing the ongoing results of the LPGA Tour, in addition to the PGA and European tours, so that she could follow the careers of her idols in women’s game. More than four decades later, she’s still contributing to the health and exposure of Australian women’s golf through her wildly successful Karrie Webb Scholarship.

In 2015, Hannah Green won the scholarship, while Julienne Soo was runner-up, and both were flown across the Pacific to attend the US Women’s Open at Lancaster Country Club in Pennsylvania. Apart from being flown to a major in the US and watching how two-time event winner Webb prepared, Green and Soo were awarded $10,000 to put towards elite amateur tournament travel expenses. Green won it again in 2016, joining Minjee Lee as a two-time Webb Series recipient.

The fact both Lee and Green went on to become multiple winners on the LPGA Tour, and major champions, speaks volumes for the impact of time spent with their idol. Grace Kim, from Sydney, was a recipient of the scholarship a record four times (2018-2021). Once Kim turned pro, she became a winner on the US secondary Symetra Tour and then on the LPGA Tour in 2023.

It’s important to note Webb’s scholarship is not just a dream week in the US with an Australian legend, it’s also a series of tournaments that provide incentive for Australian girls to practise, prepare and compete. The series is a blend of amateur and professional events where players accumulate points at each tournament based on their result. The series culminates each year in March, when the leading points scorer is chosen for the scholarship, in addition to the leading Australian woman on the World Amateur Golf Ranking.

Minjee Lee

In 2021 – the year that the Perth pro broke through the major-championship barrier at the Evian and represented Australia at the Olympics in Tokyo – Lee became the second of the “Give Back” graduates, after Smith, to donate money back to Golf Australia’s high-performance unit. Her donation was a percentage of her winnings from the 2020 season.

“I think it’s a really special thing to do,” Lee said. “All the things I got out of Golf Australia’s high-performance pathway really helped me to this point in my career, so I’m really happy to be able to give back to the kids who are in the program right now. I’ve watched ‘Webby’ giving back for so long, so I feel like I’m following in her footsteps to give back to the kids and leave the next generation of golfers in Australia in a better place.”

A year later, Lee triumphed at the US Women’s Open for a second career major and the next year she reached the milestone of 10 LPGA Tour wins. Just like her mentor, Lee continued to give up her time for Australian golf – returning to compete in the Australian Open in 2022 and 2023.

Lucas Herbert

In July 2022, as he was preparing for the 150th Open Championship at St Andrews, the Bendigo golfer was thinking about where the game began for him. After learning how to keep the ball between the treelined fairways of Neangar Park Golf Club, he then went into Golf Australia’s high-performance system to create a pathway that eventually saw him crack the world’s top 50 golfers. A week before the 150th Open, Herbert handed over the entire sum of his obligations under the “Give Back” program. After Lee and Smith, Herbert was the third elite player to repay money invested in his talent in the “Give Back” era. Herbert became a winner on both the DP World Tour and PGA Tour.

“I’m absolutely rapt to be part of this,” Herbert said at the time. “I had no hesitation when I heard about it. I’ve been very lucky to have benefited from the state and national programs when I was an amateur and a young professional out of the Bendigo area, and I’m forever grateful for that. I love the fact that the money will go straight back into the same programs that helped make me who I am today.”

Perhaps in a stroke of good karma, Herbert went on to finish T-15 at St Andrews, before adding a third career DP World Tour victory. In 2024, the 28-year-old joined LIV Golf to play alongside Ripper GC skipper Cam Smith, Marc Leishman and Matt Jones.

Hannah Green

Green’s first contribution to the Give Back program was a sizeable donation to the Australian Golf Foundation (AGF) Junior Girls Scholarship program in 2023. The West Australian made a five-figure payment and asked that half of it go to the AGF scholarship fund, which aims at increasing golf participation among girls. She also requested half of her future “Give Back” contributions also go to the AGF scholarship and the other half for Golf Australia high performance. AGF is close to Green’s heart given it has granted 2,000 scholarships to girls in Australia since launching in 2021. It has targeted 1,200 scholarships in 2024. Green isn’t just a donor, either – she’s an active ambassador. The five-time LPGA Tour winner has even sat in on Zoom calls with scholarship holders.

“I am a big believer in the value of the AGF scholarships, and I wanted to help out now that I have the opportunity,” Green said. “I’ve had contact with a lot of these scholarship girls over the past year or so and I can see up-close how much they are getting out of it.”

Adam Scott

Apart from Adam Scott’s enormous support of Australian golf’s summer calendar throughout his 24-year pro career, he also established a meaningful foundation in 2005. The Adam Scott Foundation’s aim is to provide opportunities for Australians and assist with their career prospects. The foundation partnered with Griffith University and the PGA International Golf Institute (PGA IGI) to create a scholarship that covers student contribution and, if needed, the PGA IGI course fees for a Diploma of Golf Management.

Geoff Ogilvy

Three years ago, former US Open winner Ogilvy wanted to create extra playing opportunities for elite Australian golfers of all levels while the country was shut out from the rest of the world due to COVID-19 border restrictions. Ogilvy created the Sandbelt Invitational in 2021 under his Geoff Ogilvy Foundation. The goal – apart from playing some of the world’s finest courses on the Melbourne Sandbelt – was to bring together the best players in Victoria and from across Australia. Ogilvy wanted the older players in the tournament to share wisdom to younger generations of pros and amateurs in a fun and competitive environment. It was a tradition dating back to the days of Norman Von Nida mentoring a young Peter Thomson, the five-time Open champion who reciprocated by mentoring generations of golfers after him. The inaugural Sandbelt Invitational field featured men and women pros and amateurs. There was Ogilvy himself, as well as Su Oh, Nick O’Hern, Elvis Smylie, Matt Griffin, Herbert and Sarah Kemp.