Teenager Avani Prashanth’s big Indian golfing dreams

The 15-year-old from Bengaluru, whose talent stood out in the top amateur event in the US that ended with a round at the Augusta National, wants to win gold at the 2022 Asian Games and become world No 1 at 20.

“It’s obviously much better than going to school, right?” Avani Prashanth says with a chuckle, moments before starting a 25-hour journey back home from the US. “This is the best thing to do in the world.”

Golfer Avani Prashanth.  (ANWA. )

Why wouldn’t it be if you’re 15 and playing at the iconic Augusta National Golf Club, rubbing shoulders with the top amateur golfers in the world, as the best from India. Sure, the Bengaluru teenager can’t quite chill with friends over weekends, but catching up with the new world No 1 professional golfer Scottie Scheffler at the Sage Valley Golf Club is as much fun for Avani.

“A lot of people do say that I am missing out on things. But I’m not. Because I’m doing what I love and I also get to travel so much. My friends actually prefer my life over theirs,” the Class 9 student of Greenwood High International School says. “And I don’t think I’ll trade it for anything.”

It’s been a productive 12-18 months for Avani, the country’s top woman amateur golfer ranked 124 in the World Amateur Golf Rankings (WAGR). The youngster had top-10 finishes in all her 15 appearances in WAGR events in India last year. She had four victories to go with it, two of them in professional tournaments (Hero Women's Pro Golf Tour), and was champion of the All India Juniors as well as Ladies events. Avani ended a creditable tied-16th at the Women's Amateur Asia-Pacific Championship, the best show by an amateur from India on debut. She was invited to play at the Sage Valley junior event, where she was tied-sixth last month, and at the Augusta National Women's Amateur as the first Indian. She was one of only four golfers ranked outside the top 100 to make the cut to play on the iconic course (she came through the first two rounds at Champions Retreat), finishing tied-21st at the weekend.

Playing these prestigious tournaments is a considerable step up for Avani, one that is directly proportional to her development. “It’s a much bigger learning for me from these events. In Augusta, for example, I played against the top 39 of 40 amateurs in the world. In India, there are only a couple of girls who I have serious competition with. I’m also playing in much better courses; in India you have easier courses. So, I can compare myself with the best in the world,” Avani says.

Aiming for the best is an attitude Avani has carried from a young age. Her first tryst with golf was the result of friendly banter following a game of tennis between her parents in 2007, when she was a year old. MS Prashanth had defeated his wife, who challenged him to beat her in a sport neither had played before. They decided to pick up golf in Johannesburg, where the family was based then. “My wife would go to the driving range and Avani would be in the car seat watching her practice,” Avani’s father, MS Prashanth, recalls.

A year later, they moved to Gurgaon, where Prashanth continued playing and learning golf with coach Nathan Sundaram at the Manesar Golf Club. Little Avani would be jumping all around Prashanth, eager to accompany her father to the course. “So I gave her a junior club and taught her how to hold it and swing it. Her hand-eye coordination was so natural,” Prashanth says.

Her love for golf too stood out. On a lazy Sunday, Prashanth and Sundaram went to play a round leaving Avani with a caddie. They were dumbfounded when they returned around four hours later. “We saw Avani still hitting balls. This was for four hours at four years of age.”

Prashanth had to move to Nigeria, where he first got membership at a golf club before shifting Avani there. In 2013, a six-year-old Avani qualified to play in the US Kids European Championship in Scotland, where she finished in the top-15 competing with girls aged eight and below. She also went on to play the US Kids World Championships from 2014-2019, where she ended tied-3rd and tied-5th twice.

The coaching in Nigeria wasn’t at a higher level. Thus, on his annual two trips to India, Prashanth made it a point to visit Bengaluru and take Avani along for valuable lessons with Vijay Divecha, Anirban Lahiri’s long-time coach. “We used the best of both worlds. We never let golf come second to anything in Avani’s life,” says Prashanth, who is the head of sales at Piramal Consumer Products, part of Piramal Pharma.

Lahiri has been an inspiration for Avani, and so is Bengaluru-based India No 1 woman golfer, Aditi Ashok. “Aditi’s performance at the Olympics (she finished fourth in Tokyo) was great; I watched every bit of it,” Avani says. “I played the Sage Valley event the same week Anirban finished second at The Players Championship. Watching him play that final round really got me pumped to play my round at Sage Valley.”

Not that she needs extra motivation. Avani is a “dedicated and independent golfer”, as her father puts it. She picks her caddies, takes her launch monitor wherever she travels and assesses her game in every tournament through an app called Upgame. During the pandemic lockdown when courses were shut, Avani would practice for hours on a simulator set up at their home in Bengaluru. That’s how facets of her game, like driving, approach and distance control, have developed in the last couple of years. “As soon as I played my first tournament after Covid, I could see my game improve so much. A couple of years ago I wasn’t the longest hitter, and now I’m hitting longer than the same people I used to hit much shorter than.”

Avani’s career graph, though still at a nascent stage, has seen a continued upward trajectory. No wonder her goals are lofty. “This year, I want to break into the top-75 in rankings, and win gold for India at the Asian Games. The long-term goal is to win gold at the 2024 Olympics and become world No. 1 by the time I’m 20.”