Kent Golf News: Royal St George's final, Hinge Trophy qualifiers, Canterbury's junior jamboree win and club defibrillator grants (24 October 2026)
The county calendar is winding down, but the last week of October still has two Kent Golf events on the links at Sandwich and Littlestone. Canterbury's juniors won the East Kent League Jamboree for the first time, a Westerham member captained his US university team to a title, and Kent Golf is reminding clubs about defibrillator and mental health grants before the 31 December deadline.
The Race to St George's Final is played at Royal St George's on Thursday 29 October
Kent Golf's Race to St George's Final is an 18-hole medal at The Royal St George's Golf Club in Sandwich on Thursday 29 October, open to men and women off the weekday tees with a 95% handicap allowance. The competition page listed 20 entries on 24 October.
Three days later, on Sunday 1 November, the Hinge Trophy qualifiers are split across Littlestone (Championship Links, white tees) and Royal Cinque Ports (medal tees). Both are 18 holes of stroke play for men. Entry has closed, with a fee of £65. The Hinge now uses England Golf's championship entry rules: a maximum Handicap Index of 5.4 for players over 17 and 5.5 for under-17s, and Kent Golf says it may refuse an entry if the last 20 scores include more than four general play cards or fewer than four competition scores.
The county's Christmas Meeting, a better-ball Stableford at Kings Hill on 2 December, is already full with 60 players.
Sources: Kent Golf, Race to St George's Final competition page, Kent Golf, Hinge Trophy Qualifier competition page, Kent Golf, upcoming opens, Kent Golf, Christmas Meeting competition page.
Canterbury win the Junior East Kent League Jamboree for the first time
Canterbury Golf Club won the end-of-season Junior East Kent League Jamboree with 174 Stableford points, six clear of Faversham, KentOnline reported on 23 October. Canterbury hosted as 2025 league winners, with five scores out of six counting, and the field also included juniors from Ashford, Bearsted, Boughton, Chestfield, Etchinghill, North Foreland, Rochester & Cobham, Sene Valley and Upchurch.
Jacob Bull of Chestfield took the individual prize. Sing Yan-Liu of Faversham was second on 41 points and Canterbury's Harry Andrews third on 40, from a level-par round with four birdies and one blank hole. Organiser Elizabeth Carlotti said Canterbury finished second in the league and she could not remember the club winning the Jamboree before.
At the same club, Alison Mason and Dorothy Lloyd Hughes won Canterbury's round of the Daily Mail Foursomes with 43 points, 10 clear of the field. KentOnline reports more than 190,000 players enter the club rounds across England, Scotland and Wales, which run until the end of January.
Source: KentOnline, 23 October 2026.
Westerham's Ben Lyons captains Bluefield State to an eight-shot win in North Carolina
Ben Lyons, a member of Westerham Golf Club who is at Bluefield State University in the USA on a golf scholarship, captained his team to an eight-shot victory at the SAS HBCU Invitational in North Carolina. Kent Golf says the win earned the university a $10,000 donation from the tournament sponsors.
The invitational was held alongside the SAS Championship on the PGA TOUR Champions, won by Vijay Singh, and Lyons got to meet him.
Source: Kent Golf, 23 October 2026.
Kent Golf points clubs to free CPR training and grants of up to £500 for defibrillators
Kent Golf is promoting free CPR and defibrillation training from the Air Ambulance Charity Kent Surrey Sussex. The charity says around 25 people a day across the three counties have a cardiac arrest out of hospital and only 1 in 10 survive, and that early CPR and defibrillation can more than double the chance of survival.
Clubs can pair that with a Kent Golf AED and CPR Training Grant of up to £500 towards a defibrillator and related equipment, or CPR training. Clubs that already have a defibrillator can apply for a second unit. A separate grant supports clubs recruiting and training a Mental Health First Aider. Applications close on 31 December 2026.
Sources: Kent Golf, 20 October 2026, Kent Golf, 14 October 2026, Kent Golf, bursaries and grants.
What this means for Kent golfers and clubs
Entry for the 1 November Hinge qualifiers shows as closed, so low-handicap men aiming for next year should check the handicap record rules well before the closing date: fewer than four competition scores in your last 20 can cost you a place. Club secretaries have until 31 December to apply for up to £500 for a defibrillator or CPR training, and the air ambulance charity's training is free. Juniors and parents can look at Canterbury's Jamboree result for a sense of the standard across 12 East Kent clubs.