Fran Gacos Of Copper Hill Wins 1st Women's Mid-amateur

Fran Gacos of Copper Hill, twice a runner-up in the Women’s Amateur, carded rounds of 83 and 78 to win the first NJSGA Women’s Mid-Amateur Championship on Tuesday, July 29, at the par-72 Spring Brook Country Club in Morristown.

Gacos’s total of 161 was five shots better than runner-up Katie Renoff of Trump National-Bedminster (83-83-166). Kathleen Sullivan of Spring Brook was third at 85-82-167 and Helen Bernstein of WGA of N.J. was fourth at 86-82-168 in the field of 24.

Gacos was the only Mid-Amateur to advance to the Women’s Amateur Match-Play Round of 16 which begins Wednesday at Spring Brook. Both events have run concurrently the past two days. Kelsey Solan of Burlington, a rising junior at James Madison, was medalist for the 89th Women’s Amateur.

Solan shot 71-75-146, two shots better than defending champion Alice Chen of Neshanic Valley (74-74-148) and Taylor Totland of Hollywood (77-71-148).

MID-AMATEUR LEADERBOARD WOMEN'S AMATEUR LEADERBOARD

Gacos was runner-up in the Women’s Amateur to Sukjin Lee Wuesthoff of Toms River in 2002 at Hawk Pointe and in 2004 to Kristen Nash of Montclair at Olde York.

“There are a lot of undulations out there, especially on the greens,” said Gacos, whose husband, Chris, served as caddie. “I felt my knowledge from Monday helped me today. “

She elected to play in the Women’s Mid-Amateur over the U.S. Mikd-Amateur which had local qualifying on Tuesday. Last fall, Gacos won her fourth NJSGA Women’s Senior Championship. She earned previous championships in 2005, ’06, ’07 and was runner-up to Sherry Herman in 2008 in her last appearance in the tournament. Over the past four years, Gacos was unavailable due to her commitments to play in USGA events. Last summer, This weekend, she played in her 11thUSGA Mid-Amateur.

“Today I played a bit better. I made a couple of mistakes, but I understood the course better.

The Women’s Mid-Amateur is the NJSGA’s 24th State Championship.

“Over the past several years, the average age of our contestants has declined significantly. The champions and runners-up for the past three years have all been teenagers. And, while our Senior Women's Championship for players 50 and above, attracts large fields, we had lost the mid-amateur age player (30 and above),” said Carol Graybeal, a member of the NJSGA Women’s Tournament Committee.

Players age 30 and above were automatically be placed into both championships; one entry fee covers registration for both events (to those eligible).

Female golfers age 30 and above with a USGA Handicap Index of 14.0 or less were eligible.