BURNHAM & Berrow Golf Club’s Mimi and Patience Rhodes will make history next week when they become the first sisters to compete against each other when the 2019 Justin Rose Telegraph Junior Golf Championship final takes place at Quinta do Lago in Portugal.
Rose, who is sponsoring the tournament for the first time, is part of an illustrious roll call of previous winners which also includes Tommy Fleetwood and Matt Fitzpatrick, and Ladies European Tour stars Jodi Ewart Shadoff, Melissa Reid and Carly Booth.
The siblings, who both play at Burnham & Berrow, will be part of a field of 12 girls and 12 boys bidding to add their names to the prestigious honours board when the event – regarded as junior golf’s ‘unofficial Major’ – is held at Quinta do Lago from November 13-15.
England Girls international Mimi, 17, who is ranked eighth in Europe, has been given a sponsors’ invite after a successful season which included representing Europe against America in the Junior Solheim Cup and playing in the 2019 World Junior Girls Championship in Canada.
Younger sister Patience, 15, will arrive in the Algarve with high hopes of challenging for victory after claiming her place in the elite line-up following an impressive round of four-under-par at the Irish Girls Championship at Roganstown Golf Club in April.
It will have extra significance for the Millfield School pupils as they bid for glory for themselves – and their 80-year-old golf-loving grandmother Susan.
Susan was diagnosed with terminal cancer this year but is now in remission and was able to travel to Gleneagles to watch Mimi compete in last month’s Junior Solheim Cup.
“I will make her really proud and I know she is really happy that we both qualified,” Patience said.
That sentiment was echoed by Mimi and the girls’ mother, Penny, who said their grandmother regards the pair’s qualification as “the pinnacle of everything she has ever wanted for them”.
Penny added: “She talks about it constantly and thinks it’s incredible.”
Now in its fourth decade, the prestigious 54-hole stroke play competition will be returning to the resort for the fifth time in the last six years, with this year’s finalists coming from all parts of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
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