GOLF: PRODIGY RISING.

Omar smiled as he took in the acres of green before him at the Karachi Golf Club. Something about these surroundings always brought within him a feeling of calm confidence. Despite his mere 16 years, the lanky golfer, though still unranked, had been regularly playing rounds of 72. Sometimes even better. Some were of the opinion that he could be a dark horse in the tournament.

And was he ever! Omar Khalid did not just win the 60th National Amateur Golf Championship that day, in doing so he also broke Pakistan's legendary golfer Taimur Hassan's long-standing record. Hassan, now the Chairman of Asia Pacific Golf Confederation, had been 18 when he first won the national title in 1970. Now Omar has become the youngest, at 16.

Labelled now as the 'find of the year' in golf circles, the Karachi-based Omar Khalid is an O-Levels student at Froebel Education Centre. He says that he considers himself quite lucky to have a sports-loving family. 'My father is a sports editor of an English daily and a keen golfer himself. In fact, my mother and younger brother also play golf. The four of us go together to the golf course,' he says.

Still, golf wasn't his first love. 'I fell in love with sports very early. I was playing cricket, basketball and soccer when I was only five. I was totally into cricket. By 10, I was regarded as a good leg spinner among my peers. But then only one year later, I tried my hand at golf,' says the young champion, who then took to golf like a duck to water.

'It was within the first few days on the course that I realised that golf was the sport for me. I started with the beginner's handicap of 36, but it was only a matter of a few months that I was winning age group tournaments.'

There was no looking back for Omar. 'Over the next few years I was victorious in the junior category of major golf tournaments such as the Chief of Naval Staff Open, Sind Golf Association Cup, etc.'

At 13, in 2018, he made his debut in the Faldo Series, the world's biggest series of junior golf tournaments, which take place in 30-plus countries, involving more than 4,000 golfers each year. 'I finished as the runner-up in the boys Under-16 category in Karachi.

Omar Khalid recently became the youngest Pakistani golfer to win a national title. Eos sat down with the 16-year-old for an interview

'On the basis of my performance in the Faldo Series, only a few months later, the Pakistan Golf Federation selected me for the national team, to feature in the Jack...