MacDonald completes quartet of wins
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MacDonald, a candidate to make the Great Britain and Ireland squad for next year’s Curtis Cup at Nairn Golf Club, had been hoping she may not have been able to defend her crown at Cardross Golf Club.
This is because the Nairn Dunbar member was looking to win one of the 18 qualifying places for entry into the British Women’s Open Championship at Carnoustie.
Unfortunately for MacDonald, she failed in that bid and instead decided to try and clinch a straight quartet of wins at the Scottish Women’s Junior Championships.
The 20-year-old, however, did not make the best of starts. Having only arrived at 1am that morning, MacDonald had little time to rest and prepare before her 9.30am tee off time.
An opening day 75 gave her a share of eighth place overall, four shots behind Scottish internationalist Alyson McKechin (Elderslie) and Broomieknowe’s Kate McIntosh, who both had three under par rounds of 71.
But the Stirling University student recovered on day two to shoot the lowest round of the tournament to date — a four under par 70 that brought her right back into contention.
A card that included six birdies and two bogeys put her level with McKechin at the top of the leaderboard, three shots clear of Gillian Monteith (Portpatrick), Nichola Ferguson (Clober) and Gemma Dryburgh (Beaconsfield).
MacDonald then proceeded to repeat her second rounds feats on the final day of the event to emerge a clear winner of the championship and claim the title for a fourth time.
The 20-year-old ended up triumphing by six shots from Ferguson with Rachel Walker, McKechin and Dryburgh one shot further back in joint third. MacDonald and Ferguson were the only two players in the field to finish with an aggregate score that was under par.
Grantown-on-Spey teenager Hannah McCook also played in the tournament and made steady improvement throughout the three days of competition with cards of 81, 79 and 78 to finish 25th overall.
