My 8 year old has expressed interest in playing in a golf tournament. He is 8 years old and lives in Northeast Houston. We golf at Kingwood CC. I have googled Little Linksters and stuff like that, but not really getting where I can find a tournament.


Can anyone point me in the correct direction to actually sign up for a tournament? 5 holes...9holes...anything?

Just answered my own question by filtering my Club Life app!

Would still like info on junior golf suggestions.

1. STPGA Jr golf, click on their website, go to tournaments, click on that, 3 options come up, Little Linksters, Junior Links and Junior tour. You can see the schedule there, summer there is a TON of tournaments. Back on main page click on membership, jouin ($99 annually). Then take the caddie test if you want to caddie for him. I recommend you caddie.
2. Beltway Tour, join $75 annually, look at the divisions and pick the right division and put him in. Their tournament are mostly summer Mon-Thursday.
3. Join First Tee, google First Tee Greater Houston, forgot the but it is cheap, they have session, fall, spring, summer, each session is about 8 classes and have to attend 6 of 8, once a member they have monthly tournaments all year, always at FM Law, great facility for kids, tournaments always on Saturday, fFirst Tee emphasizes them being in their own except for the very youngest.

With these 3 you can play multiple tournaments in a week if you really wanted. STPGA Jr is age based, Beltway Tour is skill based and First Tee is a combo.

Once you get experience their is US Kids, Texas Junior Golf, Legacy Junior Tour. Under Armour also has a tour for Juniors.

See if this works, Little Linksters Upcoming Tournaments

Beltway Tour Upcoming Tournaments, just looked for boys you would want to put him in Boys Iron (5 hole) or Bronze (9 hole) divisions. I had to look, because I have a daughter that plays in all these leagues, so I know the girls divisions but not the boys.

First Tee Greater Houston, click on class schedules, and several courses around the area offer the program, he will have to move up the division but as soon as you are member he can play the monthly tournaments. Registration for the summer opens up May 12th.

No shortages of tournaments to play in the Houston Area, we are blessed in that regard!!! Let me know when you sign him up so we can come say hello and wish him luck, guarantee if you sign him up we will run into each other at several tournaments. We play in the girls 11-12 divisions at least through this summer!!

I forgot, if you are interested in him doing scramble format as part of a team, look into PGA Jr League.

I checked PGA Jr. League as they are setup at my club, and it looks like y'all have a program at Kingwood as well. Here is the link with the closest search results to my area, you may need to refresh:

https://www.pgajrleague.com/junior-league-events/search?radius=100&programStatus=open

Thanks for the great info!


I signed him up for Kingwood junior tournament this Sunday. He was grinning ear to ear when I told him. He has been wanting to play a tournament for two years and I'm just now feeling like he can handle one.

Congrats on having a kid passionate about the game - must be an amazing feeling.

Also, when I recover I plan on getting back out to Kingwood again. Love Deerwood and Island especially, but the other courses are great as well. Y'all have a great group of tracks there.

My daughter played in the STPGA Jr Linksters end of season Championship Tournament, girls 11-12. Tournament was held at Clubs of Kingwood on the Forest course, beautiful course!! We had played on the Lakes course before, but the Forest course to me was beautiful, tough course that demands you can hit it straight. Good luck to him at the tournament, what league and where is the tournament at?

edit, I missed you mentioned it was at Kingwood, what league?

I signed him up via clubcorp app for what says " Sunday Junior Golf Tour - Members and Non-Members in Coaching Program"


Most excited to see how he plays. I've had him swinging since age 4. We only have 25 or so rounds in, but we keep score from the ladies tees. The past four scores have been 98 - 82 - 105 - 78 on 9 holes. I understand the tees are WAY too far, but he requires it. He laughed when I told him the distances for the 8 year olds.

Joke is on him...cutting the distance wont help his score much. He hits the ball hard, but you cannot afford a 5 putt!

As mentioned STPGA and PGA Jr are both awesome. The PGA jr teams are so much fun but they can only play up until 13. It's very competitive and the team can compete all the way to a national tournament. Also look for the drive chip putt competition each year.

PGA Junior League would be best if he's still developing. If he is ready to handle an even 100% on his own then put him in an event individually. PGA Junior League is a 2-person scramble with a modified scoring format so there is much less pressure. They also get team jerseys and swag so the kids like that. Sometimes I feel parents stick their kid an a tournament cold turkey and the amount of fear and pressure you see from them is really intense and counter-productive.

Just got back from the tournament. He had the greatest time and begging to do more.


Need to work on chipping. It was a 100 yard each 9 hole format. He was pin high or over on 8 of 9 holes and a complete failure around the green. He was spitting between mad and laughing it was so bad. One hole he had a drive-sand-other sand-other sand-original sand-one putt for a 6.

I enjoyed watching and hope to tune him in and try some of the options you have all recommended.

bumping this thread. Curious if anyone has any recent experience with STPGA little linksters? My 8 year old is wanting to play some tournaments. I feel like he's a pretty decent golfer. He for sure has that baseball swing in him since that is his first love ,but he's decent around the greens. I generally set him up on our home course about 180-200 out for a par 4 and generally speaking he's bogeying/double bogeying those prolly 60% of the time. Proud dad moment he made his first birdie over the weekend on a par 5 which I had him play at about 240 yards out. Drained a twenty footer or so for the bird.

I'm mainly curious just how serious/relaxed the tournaments are since it would be his first formal golf competition. I don't want him playing in something where it's so up tight he wont have fun.

Little Linkster is a relaxed environment, meant for kids just starting out. Take the caddy test, it is just $25 and you will breeze through it and he will have you on the bag and that is nothing but fun!! He will have a blast!!

There are a couple of us here that have kids in STPGA. IMHO it's a great organization for kids of all age and talent groups. We started our 11yo in May last year and she loves it. We did PGA Jr and Op36 before that, but STPGA is medal not team and our kid enjoys medalist more than team events.

STPGA is great. I would also recommend PGA Junior League for that first year. It's a little more relaxed than Little Linksters because of a scramble type format. i.e. no blow up holes. There are no tears in Junior League - you will see them occasionally in Little Linksters! It's all fun, but Little Linksters is a tad more serious, playing with the actual rules of golf.

Check out Under Armor Junior Tour. My son moved up into this tour between his time on PGA Junior League to now TJGT, AJGA, NTPGAJr etc.

Great league, they do 6 nine hole tournaments and you can qualify for winter nationals, summer nationals, worlds, and they now have a Thanksgiving event, among others. Jordan Spieth has now invested in the league. We had a blast on tour and he qualified for nationals each year he played, won the local league championship a few times. Nationals is played at PGA National in West Palm, and they do a ton for the kids.

Im great friends now with the league director here in Dallas. But they have leagues everywhere.

Really great for kids getting involved in the game.

https://www.uagolftour.com/