Golf Saint Lucia Inc. had much to celebrate following the recent crowning of Team Saint Lucia as the 2025 ECGA Amateur Gross Golf Champions. At an official celebration held at the Sandals Golf and Country Club on October 16, the association recognised and honoured the victorious team.
The tournament, played at the Royal St Kitts Golf Club in St Kitts and Nevis, featured four men’s groupings (aged 49 and under), three seniors (aged 50–59), super seniors (60 and over), and a ladies category. The ladies’ team from Saint Lucia claimed victory in their division and were the only team to do so, with Lisa Garner named the individual winner. Yadhu Urs, a member of Team Saint Lucia who resides in the United States, won the overall individual men’s tournament with impressive scores of 72 and 69.
In an interview with sports commentator Dr Joseph Reds Perreira, coach Tim Mangal shared that the Saint Lucian cohort began training in August for the event. Saint Lucia had previously experienced scattered success at the tournament, winning in 2003 and again two decades later in 2023. The 2025 edition featured participants from across the eastern Caribbean region, and Mangal attributed Team Saint Lucia’s triumph to their attention to detail, strategic planning, and adaptability.
“The main reason for that is just preparation. Preparation and getting the players to work together as a unit,” he said. “Some of the players, because everybody interacted with each other, helped out, although I was the main coach, but you know, people helped out with deficiencies in their swings and that sort of stuff. But at the end of the day, what got us over the line was just preparation and teamwork on the days.”
“We had a mixed team, some players who had never played this golf course before. So what we did, we used our practice rounds. I mixed up players who had played it before with players who had never played before, so that in practice rounds, we could help each other out. So that’s what we were doing.”
“It was good. The only thing that gave us a little problem was the greens were very slow, slower than what we are accustomed to. So it created some issues for us, but we did manage.”
Mangal told Perreira that spreading the gospel of golf — especially in light of the victory — is a top priority. He believes this success presents an opportunity to encourage youth participation in the sport.
“We’re looking for the publicity with it, the win. Hopefully, it could get us more golfers playing golf in Saint Lucia. We have a small community who plays and apparently some of them are very good. But you know, if you widen the pool, this is what we’re looking for, get more people interested in it, especially the youth. So our goal moving forward is to get more people involved, make it more competitive so that we could improve even more.”
