Nobody has received the Metropolis Part particular person golf championship 4 occasions, however Layla Phillips has an opportunity to be the primary.
The 14-year-old freshman from Harbor Instructor Prep carded a five-under-par 67 on Thursday at Balboa Golf Course in Encino, adequate for a six-stroke victory over Macy Lee of El Camino Actual.
“She’s been enjoying since she was 2,” defined her father Kasey, who was there to look at his daughter’s spherical and couldn’t have been extra proud. “Our outdated home was proper off of Maggie Hathaway Golf Course and balls have been continually flying onto our property. It was an annoying factor and my spouse was afraid the youngsters would possibly get hit enjoying within the yard. So we complained about it they usually provided us free classes as type of a peace providing.”
As destiny would have it, Layla and her sister Roxanne, one yr youthful, each took to the game like fish to water.
“We began taking classes at Chester Washington Golf Course as a result of that they had a greater driving vary there,” stated Layla, who began enjoying the Toyota Tour Cup collection 18 months in the past. “We get alongside nice and we follow collectively on a regular basis. She’s following in my footsteps. We’re opposites. I get actually nervous however she simply hits the ball and doesn’t care. At occasions, we’ve to take recommendation from one another.”
After bogeying the primary gap, Phillips birdied the second, eagled the third and birdied the fourth to vault to the highest of the leaderboard. She maintained no less than a two-shot lead the remainder of the best way. A bogey on No. 6 was adopted by two pars and three consecutive birdies that stretched the margin to 6.
“I can’t be too mad with my efficiency at this time however there’s all the time room for enchancment,” stated Phillips, who received to six-under earlier than bogeying 18 and who completed two strokes off the Metropolis finals report of 65 set final yr by Palisades senior Anna Music, now a freshman at Stanford. “I’ve solely performed this course twice earlier than and I’d by no means performed the again 9.”
Phillips tries to get a spherical in as soon as every week and performs a two-day match each month. She shot six-under (equaling her private finest) to win a Southern California PGA Junior Tour championship in Palm Springs in December. She has received round 50 SCPGA Junior occasions since she was 10. In March, Roxanne received the L.A. Metropolis Junior championship by 15 pictures on the identical course when she was solely 12.
“Faculty lets out at 3:30 so I’m working towards from 4 to 7:30 p.m. at Los Verdes [in Palos Verdes] or Victoria [in Carson],” stated Phillips, who completed within the prime 10 on the Junior World Golf Championship final yr in San Diego.
Phillips longs to play faculty golf (perhaps at USC, which is simply a 30-minute drive from the place she lives in Harbor Metropolis). When instructed she may doubtlessly be the primary four-time Metropolis champion, she stated: “Yeah, it’s a risk. My finest competitors in Metropolis is perhaps my sister. She’s crushed me a few occasions already.”
She will even should deal with fellow ninth-grader Lauren Music (Anna’s sister), who shot a 75 to complete alone in third Thursday to assist Palisades (+55) win its fifth straight crew title, one shy of the Metropolis report achieved twice by Granada Hills. The Highlanders completed second by 64 pictures Thursday however nonetheless superior to subsequent week’s Southern California Regionals.
