{"id":943598,"date":"2026-10-28T05:42:27","date_gmt":"2026-10-28T05:42:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/943598\/"},"modified":"2026-10-28T05:42:27","modified_gmt":"2026-10-28T05:42:27","slug":"its-impossible-to-ignore-aussie-on-amateur-golfs-big-prize-australian-golf-digest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/943598\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;It&#8217;s impossible to ignore&#8217;: Aussie on amateur golf&#8217;s big prize \u2013 Australian Golf Digest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Australia\u2019s top-ranked amateur golfer says it\u2019s impossible to ignore.<\/p>\n<p>Harry Takis will be rewarded with a coveted berth at next year\u2019s US Masters and British Open if he wins the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship in New Zealand starting Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>The 21-year-old from Brisbane also knows it\u2019s a big if.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNothing is owed to you in this game,\u201d Takis said on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEveryone marks this event on their calendar at the start of the year \u2013 you only get a few chances to play in a major.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>    <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/1793166147_204_.jpeg\" alt=\"Harry Takis.\"\/>Harry Takis is putting in the prep at Te Arai Links ahead of the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship. (<a href=\"https:\/\/photos.aap.com.au\/search\/20261028192524524658\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">PR IMAGE PHOTO<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>Takis is among eight Australians to tee off at Te Arai Links, which lines the shores of the Pacific Ocean some 100km north of Auckland.<\/p>\n<p>And he\u2019s pragmatic about the prize of a spot at the US Masters and British Open.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPeople say that they forget about it and don\u2019t think about it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou can try and lock it away \u2026 but you go to bed every night and you think about it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEveryone thinks about it. It\u2019s impossible not to.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Takis is not only the top-ranked Australian but the top-ranked amateur in the field \u2013 21st in the world.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI put a lot of pressure on myself, regardless whether I\u2019m ranked the worst player in the field or the best player in the field,\u201d said Takis, who is based at San Diego State University in the United States.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe guy that won the US Am this year was ranked 95th in the world.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s cool to get all the publicity that comes with being the highest-ranked player in the field, but everyone starts at even par.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou can make a quad on the first hole out here and it keeps you on the back foot for the rest of the week.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Takis finished fourth in last year\u2019s Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship, held in Dubai, after making his debut at the 2023 edition of the tournament staged at Royal Melbourne when he tied for 41st.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy first year playing this, I felt like an imposter; I didn\u2019t really feel like I was good enough to be there,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe had a big team of Aussies and I think I was the youngest by a couple years.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cRoyal Melbourne was a beast that week. I got beat up.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m a lot more comfortable in my golf game and I know that I can obviously hang with the best of them out here.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Four Australians have previously won the Asia-Pacific tournament: Antonio Murdaca (2014), Curtis Luck (2016), Harrison Crowe (2022) and Jasper Stubbs (2023).<\/p>\n<p>This article was made possible with support from the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championships.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australia\u2019s top-ranked amateur golfer says it\u2019s impossible to ignore. Harry Takis will be rewarded with a coveted berth&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":943599,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[566],"tags":[431724,64,63,755,210866,1736,405163,10956,85,192385],"class_list":["post-943598","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-asia-pacific-amateur-championship","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-golf","tag-harry-takis","tag-new-zealand","tag-overseas-sport","tag-pacific","tag-sports","tag-te-arai-links"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=943598"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/943598\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/943599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=943598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=943598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=943598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}