Barnard selected as 2013 Nancy Lopez Golf Achievement Award recipient

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla., September 5, 2013 – Marvol Barnard, an 11-year veteran of the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) Teaching and Club Professionals (T&CP) is the recipient of the 2013 Nancy Lopez Golf Achievement Award, which recognizes an LPGA professional who gives back to the game in the spirit of Nancy Lopez. Marvol is the teaching professional at Haven Golf Course in Green Valley, Arizona.

The Nancy Lopez Golf Achievement Award was created in 2007, and is given to an LPGA professional who emulates qualities valued by Lopez: Leadership, Passion, Giving, and Approachability. Lopez is a 48-time LPGA Tour winner and four-time Rolex Player of the Year. She was inducted into the LPGA Tour and World Golf Halls of Fame in 1987, and captained the victorious 2005 U.S. Solheim Cup Team.

Since joining the LPGA in 2002, Barnard has held many positions within the organization, including serving as a Member Advisor, the Central Section Secretary, and the chair of the Communications Committee, where she created and edited the LPGA national newsletter, The Global Connection.  Barnard currently serves as the Central Section President and is an integral part of the Executive and Leadership Committees of the LPGA. As the Executive Committee liaison for the Member Growth Committee, Barnard has spearheaded the drive to bring LPGA Teaching and Club Professional membership numbers to over 1500 for the first time in our history.  

Barnard also serves on golf industry advisory boards and has been featured several times in the online PGA Magazine “Best Practices” for her innovative programs that bring women into the game of golf.

“Marvol is the perfect example of a member who goes above and beyond to share her love of the game with others,” said Nancy Henderson, Executive Director for the LPGA Teaching and Club Professional membership. “She certainly embodies the LPGA Values of Leadership, Passion, Giving and Approachability.”

The recipient of numerous awards, Barnard was the 2010 Central Section Teacher of the Year, and in 2012, was named one of Golf Digest’s Top 50 Women Instructors.  She holds several teaching certifications, and attends numerous training seminars throughout the year.  She has created a thriving instruction business in her hometown, and is especially passionate about creating learning and playing opportunities for women.  Barnard is active in philanthropic activities in her community and in utilizing golf as a vehicle for fundraising and growth opportunities for companies and individuals.

 “I am absolutely thrilled to receive the 2013 Nancy Lopez Golf Achievement Award,” said Barnard.  “Nancy Lopez is such a wonderful role model to me, and to countless numbers of people in and out of the golf world, so to receive this award in her name is a tremendous honor.  I am so very grateful to have my name added to the list of stellar past recipients.  I feel so privileged to be part of an organization that celebrates and encourages Leadership, Passion, Giving and Approachability, all the traits that Nancy Lopez so beautifully models.” 

Prior to Barnard’s career in the golf industry, she was a dispatch supervisor for the Alaska State Troopers in Fairbanks, Alaska, where she met her husband Sam, an Investigator in the department.  After retirement from the Troopers, they lived aboard their 42-foot boat, Princess, and cruised and fished commercially in Southeast Alaska, Canada and the Puget Sound for twenty years.  During their time as snowbirds in Arizona, escaping from the cold winters of Alaska, Barnard discovered golf, and her second career was born.