Year 10 student Cooper Moore shares his experience at the Junior Golf World Cup in Japan.

We flew into Narita and then stayed the night in Atsugi where we were hosted by the City Council, which also hosted the NZ Golf Olympic Team in 2021.

On our first day we met with students from a local High School and played 9 holes with them at the Atsugi Kokusai Country Club. This course was amazing with not a blade of grass out of place.

In the afternoon we took the Bullet Train from Atsugi to Nagoya. I really enjoyed the trip. It was a great experience and I also got to see Mt Fuji.

Once we arrived in Nagoya we started our preparation for the World Cup. All the teams stayed at the same accommodation, The Princess Garden, and each day everyone was bused one hour to the Chukyo Country Club, located in the mountains of Nagoya.

We had two practice rounds, long drive competition and an Opening Ceremony before the start of the World Cup.

The course was very long, with an average length of 6902 metres over the four rounds. It was undulating and covered with bunkers.

Unfortunately, I didn't start the tournament as well as I would have liked. In the first round I battled off the tee and found myself hitting from the rough too often. This meant I struggled to get the ball to hold on the greens with my approach shots. I ended the first round with a 5 over 76.

The second round I was better off the tee but my approach shots and putting let me down and I carded a 4 over 75.

Round three's conditions were the toughest with torrential rain / monsoon conditions. I mapped my way around the course really well, only missing one fairway on the day and drained some really big par putts. I recorded the 9th best score of the day with an even par 71, and the best score of the day was 3 under 68.

The final round was in similar conditions to the first nine holes. I took a lot of confidence out of my third round and again mapped my way around the course really well. Once the weather cleared I got into a good groove and played the back nine 2 under par to finish the day with a one under par 70.

While I didn't play as well as I would have liked, I still came away learning a lot from playing on a true Championship course and against the best players in the world. I also proudly wore my St Bede's College sports socks everyday as part of my uniform.

I now know what I need to do to compete at this level and I'm really looking forward to hopefully going back next time when I'm older, stronger, and have fine-tuned some aspects of my game.

Off the course we were treated really well, we got to experience lots of Japanese food and culture.

This was definitely one of the best golf courses I have played and tournaments I have attended.