Two Renfrewshire brothers who count Barrhead’s Fereneze as their home club are to take part in the US Kids Golf World Championships after they both won UK titles on the same day.
Evan Macaulay, who turns nine in November, won the 8 to 9 category at the Wee Wonders British Championships grand final in North Berwick, while younger sibling Lucas, who turned six in June, came out on top in the 5 to 6 category.
Past players of the British tournament, include Ryder Cup team members Robert McIntyre, who sent the boys a message congratulating them and wishing them good luck for America, as well as Tommy Fleetwood and Tyrrell Hatton.
Thanks to their success in East Lothian, the pair and their proud parents Callum and Clare-Marie will now be heading out next year to Pinehurst, North Carolina for the globe’s largest junior golf tournament.
Callum said: “The Wee Wonders is a fantastic event. It was brilliant to see all the kids from all over the UK just playing each other, having fun and meeting others.
“The boys are really close and they are very supportive of each other and happy for each other.
“They they try and encourage each other and they play so much golf together as well, so it's good.
“We celebrated in the way that the two boys would want to celebrate anything we went to McDonald's.
“It had been such a long weekend in in North Berwick and emotionally draining, certainly for me and Clare-Marie , but I think for the boys, they were just physically exhausted, so we stopped at McDonald's about about half an hour outside North Berwick on the way home and got some food.”
Following their success, the boys are now “buzzing” to head stateside for the world championship, which provides a stage for the sport’s “next generation of stars to shine”.
The competition was previously the subject of a documentary, currently on Netflix, which features talented players age seven and eight and includes interviews with golf legends such as Jack Nicklaus.
“There’s a funny story behind (the boys’ success)," explained the 39-year-old dad.
"We went on holiday and trying to keep a six and an eight year old entertained on a flight can be difficult, so we downloaded this programme called the Short Game.
“Lucas became obsessed with it. He would watch it every day and he started copying the celebrations.
“Ironically, the tournament they’ve qualified for is the one they were watching on that, so that's been really that's been really cool to see.
“It's just a case of suppose getting them prepared to go now there. There’s a lot of golf and a lot of practicing to be done before then."
The pair, who are from Paisley, have had clubs in their hands since the time they could stand and come from a golfing-mad family, which includes their parents, grandparents, aunties and uncles.
Callum won the Scottish amateur title in 2008 and then played professionally around Europe for a few years, while Clare-Marie, 37, who is a full-time classroom assistant at Dargavel Primary, was a golf teaching professional at Paisley Golf Club for several years.
“We've always had golf in our family,” added Callum.
“It’s been embedded in our family for a long time, so we can obviously share our experience with them, but it's important that we don't push them to a point where they are not enjoying it.
“That's not what we're trying to do. We're trying to just encourage them and allow them to enjoy it when they can.”
As well as golf, the brothers both play football for Gleniffer thistle in Paisley and enjoy training and playing both sports after school and at the weekends.
As well as Fereneze, they are members of Paisley and Tulliallan Golf Clubs, and Troon municipal courses.
“Both fereneze and Paisley have been really good with them, but they are affiliated with Fereneze,” said Callum.
“They've both represented the club in junior matches already, so they're getting accustomed to that sort of team environment as well.
“The boys get on really well with the staff up there. They're just really good with them.
“We’ve planned a fundraising race night on October 21 at Fereneze because obviously there is going to a pretty substantial outlay to go out to America.”
The brothers are in primary two and primary five at St Charles' Primary in Paisley.
Teachers at the school were very keen to find out how they got on after they had to take the day off for their practice round in North Berwick.
"The teachers and head teachers knew why they were going, so it was nice news for them,” added the dad.
“Evan were went round and told the dinner ladies and the nursery. He was was really excited.
"They have both done well.”
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