Lee Wins Big Island Amateur Championship At Manua Lani

The 95th Annual Big Island Amateur Championship was held September 22nd and 23rd on the Francis H. I’i Brown North Course at Mauna Lani Resort. The 36-hole, stroke-play competition was won by Davis Lee (pictured below) from Honolulu, Hawai‘i. Lee’s 68-72 (140) was five shots better than second place finisher Pono Yanagi of Hilo, Hawai‘I 72-73 (145). As a resident of Hilo, Yanagi claimed the Big Island Resident Champion title.

Lee is in his junior year at Mid-Pacific Institute, a college preparatory high school in Honolulu, and is the Hawaii State Junior Golf Association’s current Player of the Year for boys 15-18 years old.

The Big Island Amateur Championship has been played every year since 1924 making it the second oldest golf tournament in the state of Hawaii behind the Manoa Cup and one of the longest running and most prestigious amateur events in golf. The tournament has been hosted at Mauna Lani Resort since 2005. Played on the iconic resort’s famed North Course, a total of 71 golfers competed across five flights in the 2018 Big Island Amateur Championship. To view all the scores from the 95th Annual Big Island Amateur, please visit the Hawaii State Golf Association website at www.hsga.golf.

Mauna Lani’s North Course, a Flint, Cain and Nelson design, was built on an ancient lava bed and is ranked by Golfweek as one of the top courses on Hawaii. Overlaying the rugged brown pahoehoe lava flow, the North Course features rolling fairways and through kiawe forests. A 230-acre protected archeological district lies on the northern edge of the North Course, while feral goats roam the course, cropping the grass and providing a unique neutral hazard. The par-3 17th is the signature hole on the North Course as a series of elevated tees form a natural amphitheater with the green at the base of a lava bowl.

For more information on Mauna Lani Resort and Golf, visit www.maunalani.com or call 808-885-6655.