Atalaya Golf & Country Club is an avid supporter of youth in golf. Aspiring young golfers from all over Europe and points beyond journey to Atalaya to fine tune their skills and prepare for tournament competition. These young hopefuls consider Atalaya their home-away-from-home golf venue with its 36 holes of championship golf and state-of-the-art practice facilities.
Atalaya takes great pride in supporting young golfers on their individual journeys to success. Through the years the majority of the golfers who Atalaya has sponsored has been female. This factor has in no way been by design; it is merely the way things worked out.
Probably the most noted of all the golfers Atalaya has sponsored is Azahara Muños. From San Pedro de Alcántara, Azahara spent approximately 11 years training and practising at Atalaya. She worked with personal golf coach Fernando Vega Cabeza, who formerly was a professional teacher at Atalaya’s golf academy. Vega remains a member of the Atalaya team to this day.
A member of both the Ladies European Tour and the LPGA, Azahara’s career earnings top $6,000,000. Her history as both an amateur and a professional is impressive.
As an amateur Azahara won the Spanish Amateur title in 2002 when she was only 14 years old. Then in 2004, she was crowned Girls Amateur. In 2008 she was the runner-up at the Ladies US Amateur championship, and in 2009 she won the British Ladies Amateur title.
Azahara attended Arizona State University in the USA; she graduated in 2009 with a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology. While at Arizona State she was the NCAA Individual Champion in 2008. In both 2008 and 2009 she won the Edith Cummings Munson Award. This award is given by the Women’s Golf Coaches Association (WGCA) to the player who becomes both a WGCA All-American Scholar and a WGCA All-American.
In 2009, Azahara played as an amateur in both the US Women’s Open and the Women’s British Open.
Later in 2009, she turned professional. Her professional debut was at the Ladies European Tour Madrid Ladies Masters. She won the event!
On the Ladies European Tour she has also won, not once but two times each, France’s Lacoste Ladies Open and Spain’s Andalucía Costa del Sol Open.
In 2010, Azahara joined the LPGA tour and won the Louise Sluggs Rolex Rookie of the Year award. In 2012, she had her first LPGA win at the Sybase Match Play Championship and she ended the year eighth on the LPGA tour money list.
Azahara played on Team Europe in the Solheim Cup in 2011, 2013, 2015 and 2019, and she participated in the Tokyo Olympics this year. She also played in the Rio Olympics in 2016.
Atalaya Golf is very proud to have been a part of Azahara’s early days of golf. The Atalaya Family remains committed to promoting excellence in golf by regularly sponsoring talented, young, players who, like Azahara, may one day emerge on tour.
Photos from “azagolf” – INSTAGRAM
