Golfing Scrapbook of     "Koala" Karl Vilips

Welcome to Karl's personal Golfing Scrapbook. Back in 2008 when I first decided to chronicle my son's golf, this was originally intended as a means of keeping friends and family updated with his golf. However, things have changed a little since then, so nowadays this is also where Karl's supporters can keep up with Karl's journey as a junior golfer and to also find out a little about what he gets up to off the course. This site is both a chronicle of Karl's golf achievements to date and also a reference point for other parents of golfing kids.

Karl returned from the USA in August with his 2nd world title at the tender age of  9. Since the age of 5 his only coaching has been and still is from a combination of attending weekly junior clinics and from his Dad. In the month leading up to July's Junior World Championships he trains as much as he can, but aside from that Karl actually trains very little and prefers to either simply go out with friends for a round, or to play in one of the club's daily competitions.  Maybe when he's older he'll practice more, but for now he's enjoying it all just as it is.

Karl's  his own person and proud of being an individual and also proud of his achievements, particularly being from an impoversished background. In 10 years time he may be playing cricket for Australia, or he may have stuck at it and be playing Collegiate Golf in the US, who knows? All we can go on is what he's achieved to date and where he's at right now. He doesn't want to be the next Tiger, Rory or Rickie, nor does he keep statistics. He is his own person with his own style who simply enjoys playing all sports and happens to be good at golf.

Aside from golf, Karl also likes Ripsticking, playing his XBOX Kinect, watching cartoons like Ben 10 and Sponge Bob Squarepants, playing football, athletics and swimming. Most of all though, he likes hanging out with friends.

You can see both photos & videos of his golf highlights to date, view his Biography, or check out his latest news. 

If you're a parent of a young golfer and wondered if your child was the only one who hated hitting a bad shot or wanted to know about what clubs your 6-year-old needs, then there's the Feedback page where you can see that a lot of us parents go through the same stages with our golfing kids.

I'm Karl's Dad and it's me that updates things here. My name is Paul and I invite you to feel free to check it out and to email us with any comments, questions or words of encouragement for Karl that you may have at pauls@westnet.com.au.

Latest News: 

22nd February: No news to speak of, as there have been no junior events for a month despite it being summer, so Karl's wound his practice right back and has been playing cricket and baseball. However, Karl did go on a school camp all of last week, so had a great time with that.

With his next junior tournament this weekend being a 36-hole event, I'd expect that after such a long lay-off that Karl's biggest challenge to be to play to his handicap.

7th February: Karl appeared on Triple M's "Hot Breakfast" with Eddie McGuire. The 65 second interview can be heard here.

6th February: Karl appears in Melbourne's Sun Herald newspaper. Article here.

6th February: Karl played in the Flinders Golf Club's Pro Am located on the picturesque Mornington Peninsula.

The course was stunning, making play a pleasure.However, the main reason for the day was to help raise funds for the charity "Very Special Kids" which helps terminally ill children. Anyone wanting to help these kids can go to the website here.

4th February: The Monthly Medal at Karl's club saw him Teeing off from the full Championship Tees, thereby seeing him needing much more club on all holes, and not being able to reach many of the holes in regulation.

With the added length Karl typicallyl hasn't got any hope of playing to his handicap in Monthly Medal rounds and usually shoots in the mid-high 80's. However, Karl embraces a challenge and today's round of 83 was his best Monthly Medal round to date.

With no tournaments at all until the end of the month, Karl will take a laid-back approach for the next week or so.

30th January: Karl shoots 78 "off-the-stick" for 37 Stableford points in Monday's club competition at Southern Golf Club. With an ACR (Australian Course Rating) of 73, that equated to a 5-over Par round, equaling his own Personal Best. I was only there for the "Back-Nine", but with increasingly strong winds of up to 45mph that saw limbs falling off the trees around us, his ball control into the wind was possibly the best that I've seen from him.

Also, we've uploaded video from Karl playing the tournament at The Metropolitan Golf Club on the 23rd of January. To view that, click here

27th January: With school commencing for the year next week the Gross & Nett winners of this summer's events all played off in the "Summer Series Final" at the Croydon Golf Club in perfect summer weather. Unlike the event at Metropolitan last week, this time we checked that we had Karl's clubs in the car before we left home at 5.30 in the morning for the hour drive to the course.

Karl competed in the Under 14 division and played solid golf for an 84. Although not at his best after such an early start, Karl missed just the one fairway, whilst unfortunately his fairway woods let him down again for the 2nd week straight. However, his short game was solid enough to see him record a respectable score. A year ago he was signing for much higher scores when things weren't going perfectly, so what's become evident lately is that he's able to avoid having a bad score even when his game isn't firing on all cylinders.

The amazingly consistent 13-year-old Ryan Ruffels left the entire field in his wake with a 2-under Par 70 to scoop the prizes, whilst Karl finished 4th out of the 15 players in his division. Full results can be viewed here.

Karl will now have a break from tournaments for a month to sort out his fairway woods in preparation for the Colts (Under 21) Pennants season which begins in March.

There are heaps of Karl's videos available to view at his YouTube page at http://www.youtube.com/user/KarlGolf

For archived "Latest News", click here