Member Clubs
“...It will be a great way to show
our course off to the women that
haven’t necessarily gotten to
see it in the past.”
—Donna Andrews
Donna Andrews, Virginia Golf Hall of Famer
and the tournament’s namesake, won the
1994 Nabisco Dinah Shore, one of the
LPGA’s major championships.
They will do so again in early May to
ensure the inaugural event runs smoothly
less than two months later.
“The golf course has proven itself as
a great tournament course with the Fox
Puss,” Andrews said. “They’ve shown that
they can do it. They’re not new to tourna-
ment golf, so they’ve shown they can do it.
It’s a tournament golf course, it’s a great
golf course, and it will be a great way to
show our course off to the women that hav-
en’t necessarily gotten to see it in the past.”
vsga.org
Andrews served as a guest analyst
during the Atlantic Coast Conference
Women’s Golf Championship at Sedge-
field Country Club in Greensboro, N.C.,
in mid-April, and used the platform to
promote the tournament. She and her
mother, Helen, passed out brochures
and flyers to get as many of the ACC’s top
golfers to consider the tournament during
the summer schedule.
It was one of the many ways the tourna-
ment has reached out to the college players.
Washburn said The Donna reached
out to the top 25 Division I and II col-
lege coaches back in January, reached
out to them again in early April, and then
spread the word to regional and Division
III coaches.
“There’s been a push on the college side
from that perspective,” he said.
The tournament has also utilized
geofencing—the ability to send out noti-
fications to electronic devices when they
enter a set location—at multiple collegiate
events in order to spread the word. Wash-
burn said the traffic to the tournament’s
website drastically increased during
those weekends.
“It certainly isn’t a one-man show,”
Andrews said. “There’s been so many peo-
ple that have been willing to
step up and volunteer and that’s
why it has taken off the way it
has, it’s because of all the people
volunteering their time to make
this a success. I’m honored that
it has my name on it.”
The Donna allows players to
rack up World Amateur Golf
Ranking points, in addition to
VSGA player ranking points.
The tournament is also working
with the Carolinas Golf Associa-
tion to allow its members to use
it as a CGA Ranking event.
The Donna is the fourth
player-ranking tournament in
Virginia. It joins the Richmond
Women’s Golf Association City
Amateur, The Roanoke Valley
Golf Hall of Fame and the Coun-
try Club of Virginia Invitational,
which is a four-ball event.
“I was really excited. I think one thing
that is missing in women’s golf, both in
the amateur division and the mid-amateur
ranks, is kind of more invitational tourna-
ments,” Greenlief said. “There are a lot of
national championships and big regional
events, but there are very few regional or
local tournaments where you can earn
World Amateur Golf Ranking points. So
to have one come to Virginia and be able
to play an extra event in the schedule every
year is really huge.”
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