RECENTLY playing for the Philippines in IMG Academy Junior World Championships, Alethea Paige “Ally” Gaccion has emerged as one of the youngest golfer from Cagayan de Oro City to compete in an international game at the age of 11.
Alethea, despite being asthmatic, began her journey into the world of sports at the age of five when her father, Alfred Gaccion, introduced swimming to her.
“When she was young, she had this asthma, so I looked for a sport that would help her combat with this problem. Eventually, I was told that swimming is a good sport for asthmatic people. That's why I engaged her in swimming,” Alfred said.
“While she was doing swimming, I was thinking if she's regularly practicing, why would we not try out to engage ourselves in competitive swimming? Which I told her,” he added.
And Alethea expressed interest in joining competitions for swimming.
Studying in St. Mary's School, located in Mandumol, Macasandig, this city, Alethea became a part of the school's swimming team and has entered in competitions with them, winning in both in school and regional levels.
However, her time in swimming did not last long.
“In swimming, she did not do good as she did in golf. She was too young, too small, at that time,” Alfred said.
At six years old, Alethea found out about triathlon and her focus shifted to this from swimming.
In 2013, she started competing in the junior triathlon in Cebu, the Alaska Ironkids, and won third place.
Her interest in triathlon span until she was eight, the age she was introduced to the game of golf.
“I introduced to her the game of golf. And eventually she liked it so I asked her to choose what sports would she pursue, either triathlon ba or golf. She cannot master one if she would play both sports, so I asked her to choose,” Alfred said.
Alfred is a huge influential figure to Alethea, as aside from being her father, he's also a golfer.
“Before, I made it a point that I always go to the golf course. So when I go to the golf course, she's always with me and observe me,” Alfred said.
According to Alfred, Ally found her practice for the triathlon rigid and very stressful. It was when she shifted to golf that she found the sport very relaxing.
“From my personal assessment, I would see her that she is very happy because of the relax practice. So that's why I think she really enjoyed the game at the time when I started introducing to her the golf,” Alfred said.
Alfred, as a golfer, also had his fair share of trophies from the golf tournament he had competed before however, he's not as competitive as his daughter.
“After a period of practice, when we were not yet joining competitions, she was already very eager to get one of the medals,” he said.
He added that whenever Ally saw his trophies in his office, she would tell him that she will win more than what he got.
“She would say, 'Someday I will be winning more than what you got,'” Alfred shared.
And true to her, she did win several trophies, more than 50 at that, according to Alfred.
This year, Ally has been into various golf tournaments.
She played in two tournaments last May. One was when she won second place for the qualifying tournament for the IMG Academy Junior World Championships. This gave her the ticket to compete in the international game where she represented the Philippines and was ranked 48th.
Another qualifying golf tournament she played for was the US Kids Golf, where she won as champion.
Unfortunately, she was not able to compete in the US Kids Golf in North Carolina as the tournament was held in July, the same month as the IMG Academy Junior World Championships in San Diego.
Alfred said, if Ally joined the US Kids Golf, they would have stayed outside the country for a month, which will compromise his daughter's studies.
“We only asked her school for 3-week vacation, we cannot afford anymore to stay there for one month because of the school. So we just let it go, we did not anymore join the international competition for the US Kids Golf,” Alfred said.
At present, Alethea is preparing and practicing for the upcoming qualifying game for the National Golf Association Philippines Training Program, which will show whether she will be accepted or not for the program.
“We applied and we're now preparing so that she will be qualified because we have to undergo qualifying rounds,” Alfred said.
“We also expect there will be Junior Golf Tournament in Manila starting February next year,” he added, saying that the months of October to December are the “off season” for golf.
Alfred also shared that they are planning to have Ally apply for college golf scholarships in the United States as his daughter expressed interest in studying and playing golf abroad.
This shows that it’s never too young to be prepared and for Althea, being an 11-year-old athlete with asthma, nothing will stop her from enjoying her youth.