Nightingale to officiate as guest speaker

Sports

FORMER national golf representative Darrie Nightingale will officiate as the guest speaker of next Saturday’s SP Sports Awards presentation night in Port Moresby.
This was made known during the announcement of the awards finalists last week.
Nightingale is the second local talent to feature as a guest speaker, after Takale Tuna’s 2021 appearance in the South Pacific Brewery-sponsored event.
Her appearance is special in that she was the inaugural female athlete of the year when the awards ceremony was held in 1992.
Nightingale is now the first local sporting heroine to feature as a guest speaker of the event, marking the awards’ 30th year.
She is the widow of the late John Nightingale, owner of the Agmark Group of Companies and major sponsor of Digicel Cup side Rabaul Gurias.
For many years, Nightingale and her late husband supported sports across the country.
She started playing golf in 1976 after the birth of her first child, James.
“I started in June, 1976, and never looked back,” Nightingale said.
Since then, she has had many successes at different levels of golf in Papua New Guinea and Australia. These include:

Darrie Nightingale (right) with fellow 1991 South Pacific Games gold-winning teammates Sagi Seko and the late Rosemary Munaga.
– Pictures supplied
  • Madang Open champion (1979 and 1980);
  • Rabaul Golf and Squash Club champion, and New Britain Open champion (1985, 1986, 1988, 1989, 1991, and 1993);
  • Lae Golf Club champion (1994);
  • Kokopo and Kerevat Open champion; and,
  • Kavieng Open champion.

Following the 1994 volcanic eruption, the New Britain Open was moved to Kokopo, where Nightingale continued her winning streak from 1995 to 2006.
“In 1994, I took my youngest son, Steven, to Brisbane to play in the World Masters,” she recalled.
“My children (James, Steven, and Nemika) caddied for me on the last day of the games, where I won gold.”
Nightingale won gold in the 1991 South Pacific Games.
“In 1991, PNG hosted the South Pacific Games,” she said.
“We played golf in Lae, where I won gold in the singles and my side won gold in the team category, along with my teammates Sagi Seko, from Madang, and the late Rosemary Munaga, from the (Royal) Port Moresby Golf Club.”
Nightingale won gold in the Arafura Sports Festival in 1991, 1992 and 1995.
After moving to Sydney, she joined the Castle Hill Club and Asquith Golf Club.
Nightingale was the champion for both clubs. She won gold in the 2017 World Masters Games in Auckland, New Zealand.
“I won medals, including gold in the Pan Pacific Games and Asia Pacific Masters Games on the Gold Coast,” said Nightingale, a former golf champion of the Yamba Country Club.
The presentation night will be held virtually at Crowne Hotel.
It will be streamed live on the SP Sports Awards’ Facebook page and broadcast on EMTV.