Zandre Roye and Mattea Issa were crowned national amateur golf champions on Sunday at the Caymanas Golf Course in St. Catherine after three challenging rounds.

Both golfers are first time champions. Issa won by seven shots while Roye won by four after posting his best score in the final round.

Roye matched his first round four birdies but only had two bogeys to close the round on two under par 70 after scoring one under 35 for the front nine and another one under par 35 for the back nine.

His birdies came on holes number two, six, seventeen and eighteen while the bogeys were on holes four and sixteen. His three-round scores were one under par 71, five over par 77 and 70 for a total of three over par 219.

He was pleased with copping his first national championship after getting close on several occasions.

“Coming into this tournament year after year and seeing the trophy and wondering when I am going to get my name on it and its just my time now," he said.

“The course conditions were a little bit tricky out there with it being so dry but we are used to the conditions. I think I manage the game today out of all three days, pretty well. The putting was just not there this weekend but I hit a lot of greens and that helped a lot,” Roye added.

2022 national champion Oshae Haye moved from third place on the first and second day to end the in second place, four shots behind Roye. Haye posted scores of three over par on day one and two respectively and one over par 73 on the final day for a combined score of seven over par 223.

Junior golfer Trey Williams performed very well in the championship after taking over the lead at the end of the second round with a one under par 71 but was pegged back in the final round with four over par 76 in the third round. His total score of eight over par 224 included 77 in the first round, to be one stroke off the runner-up spot.

First time national female champion Mattea Issa got the better of many-time national champion Jodi Munn Barrow to win by seven shots.

Issa's final day scorecard showed three birdies, six bogeys and two double bogeys for seven over par 79.

Her first and second round scores were nine over par 81 on each day for a combined score of 25 over par 241. Munn-Barrow's scores were 84, 81 and 83 for a total of 32 over par 248, for the runner-up spot.

"It feels really good. I am really happy. I am very happy for the win but diving deeper more into my game I wish I have played better. I have been playing really well recently and I am not sure if it’s the combination of the conditions, it’s very dry at the moment, the greens are in the best shape so I just have to figure out how I can properly play the course because I know that everybody had a difficult time this weekend. So, I just have to analyze that and keep on progressing and keep on getting better," said a very pleased Issa. 

Another former national champion Sean Morris copped the trophy for the national senior champion on the back of scores of 84, 74s and even par 72 to close the championship at 12 over par 228.

The national super senior champion was Keith Stein 227 (78, 71, 78). Philip Prendergast 232 (72, 82, 78) bagged the runner-up spot while former Jamaica Golf Association (JGA) president Wayne Chai Chong 235 (85, 76, 74) was third.

Munn-Barrow, the current JGA president praised the players for their performances.

“What we saw was very good performances from all of our juniors in all of the various categories. So, it was a good week, the only disappointment for this week was the lack of sponsorship of our national event. I am hoping that next year we can get sponsorship so we can have an even bigger and better event.”

Zandre Roye and Mattea Issa both had a three-point lead over their nearest competitors at the end of the first round of the Jamaica Golf Association's National Amateur Golf Championship being played at the Caymanas Golf Club in St. Catherine.

Roye scored even par 72 for the round to lead former national champion and club mate Oshae Haye and Jack Stein by three strokes after they both scored three over par 75.

They were being tracked closely by young guns Rocco Lopez and Trey Williams who are just two strokes back on five over par 77.

Roye had a good front nine and was up by two between holes six to eight after copping two birdies on holes two and six but bogeyed number eight to close on one under par 35.

He started the back nine by dropping a shot on hole number 10 but recovered on holes 11 and 12 to be up by two shots between 12 to 15 but dropped a shot on 16 and 17, then parred 18 to close the back nine on one over par 37.

His four birdies were cancelled out by the four bogeys which he scored in the round. That makes him the only golfer to go into day two with a clean sheet to build on.

Junior player Mattea Issa scored nine over par 81 to take the lead over many time national champion Jodi Munn-Barrow who ended the first round on twelve over par 84. Alessandra Coe, another junior player was just two shots behind on 14 over par 86.

Both Roye and Issa were happy with their first round performance under hot and windy conditions on the course, while looking forward to extending their lead at the end of the second round of the three-round championship.

The second round will get under way at 8:30 am on Saturday morning.

There will be a new male and female champion this year as William Knibbs and Michelle McCreath who are the 2023 champions did not tee off on Friday and will not feature in the championship this year.