Nine First Tee members from California to the Carolinas, and from Texas to Pennsylvania, were recently selected winners of the inaugural CoBank PEAK Performers contest, which earns them spots in a four-day, all-expenses-paid golf event next month that will include playing with World Golf Hall of Famer Annika Sorenstam at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs, the site of the first of her 72 LPGA Tour victories.
The nine juniors include two from Colorado — 15-year-old Sarah Abercrombie of The First Tee of Pikes Peak in Colorado Springs, and 14-year-old Hunter Swanson from The First Tee of Green Valley Ranch in Denver.
The PEAK Performers event — co-sponsored by Denver-based CoBank, The Broadmoor and The First Tee of GVR — was open to First Tee members nationwide. Applicants were judge based on their academic and leadership records, playing resumes and essays about their experience at The First Tee and the impact the program has had on their lives.
Those selected will play golf on Aug. 23 at The Broadmoor with Sorenstam, who won the 50th U.S. Women’s Open at the resort in 1995. After a breakfast meeting with the kids, she’ll play six holes each with three threesomes at the East Course. Also on the agenda for The First Tee kids will be a four-day, three-night stay to The Broadmoor (Aug. 21-24), including visits to the Air Force Academy and Pikes Peak, and leadership instruction oriented around The First Tee’s nine core values.
“I am honored to meet and play golf with these nine wonderful participants from The First Tee on the course that really kick-started my championship career at the 1995 U.S. Women’s Open,” said Sorenstam, a national spokesperson for The First Tee. “The Broadmoor means a lot to me and sharing this experience with these kids on this beautiful property is very special indeed.”
The CoBank PEAK Performers winners that will play with Sorenstam on Aug. 23 are, in addition to Abercrombie and Swanson, Jackson Boldt and Luke Boldt, both 16 and from The First Tee of Coastal Carolinas; Andrew Santiago Caldwell, 16, from The First Tee of Pine Mountain in Kentucky; Nina Goodrich; 16, from The First Tee of Greater St. Louis; Joshua Lim, 17, from The First Tee of Greater San Antonio; Victoria Slawinski, 17, from The First Tee of Pittsburgh; and Borina Sutikto, 14, from The First Tee of Silicon Valley.
The PEAK Performers event was the brainchild of the folks who conduct and sponsor the CoBank Colorado Open Championships each year at GVR and that run The First Tee of GVR.
