The end of the summer junior golf season is upon us. In fact, Josh Herman and I will be previewing the upcoming fall high school golf season in the Aug. 18 edition of the Journal Star.

Seems like yesterday, but for nearly 30 years I have watched juniors play golf. Recruiting, reporting and watching my daughters, junior golf has taken me to many courses in and out of Illinois and even into Canada.

I walked fairways during the elite Rolex Tournament of Champions, watching, if only for a few minutes, players I knew I didn’t have a chance to recruit.

And I traveled to a Midwest hamlet called Strawberry Point, Iowa, for a postseason event where I knew only one girl in the field would ever play collegiate golf.

In all honesty, I’m at the point now where I’m beginning to forget many of the events to which I’ve traveled and the organizations that sponsored those events.

So understand my lack of excitement when I heard of yet another junior golf tour being formed when Sean Kennedy put together The Prep Tour in 2012.

Now, as The Prep Tour nears the end of its second season with a two-day event today and tomorrow in Macomb, my thoughts have moved 180 degrees. I applaud what the former Henry-Senachwine High School teacher and coach has done.

Let’s face it, summer sports activities for high school kids has become a major business. Basketball, baseball, softball, golf and just about any other sport you would like to name, are being offered for aspiring young athletes by some clever and visionary entrepreneurs.

These summer programs have been marketed as the best way to find a college scholarship. That’s fair, I guess, and many of these summer programs like to mention on their website the college coaches who attend their events.

I don’t know if all the coaches listed do in fact attend, nor do I know how long they stay at a three- or four-day event.

This newspaper finds it newsworthy to send my colleague Dave Reynolds on the road occasionally to chronicle the recruiting efforts of the Bradley Braves men’s basketball team, as well the stories of some of the area’s more talented AAU hoops players.

In fairness, I spent a lot weekends this summer either watching hoops or softball in one major metro area or another, all in the name of high school athlete improvement.

But I’m getting off point here.

Kennedy’s Prep Tour is a competitive answer to central Illinois junior golfers who want to test their ability, but may not want to spend the money or have the funds for extended regional or national travel.

There is no question the American Junior Golf Association (AJGA) has become a mega-business with year-long competition, significant fees and a well-defined selection process. The AJGA is looking for a specific type of golfer to play in its events and that is their organizational right.

The Illinois Junior Golf Association has done an outstanding job in providing junior golfer opportunities; unfortunately the majority of their players are from the Chicago area. The Mid-America Junior Golf Tour, sister tour of the IJGA, has opened up more opportunities for aspiring players with regional venues and 36-holes events. Still, cost and travel associated with the MAJGA can be prohibitive to some.

Piper Glen Golf Course in Springfield offers a nice tour for juniors, but it’s $70 for 18-hole events and as much as $800 for 12-tour stops.

Enter Kennedy’s Prep Tour, a grass roots organization that sponsors 18- and 36-hole junior events on quality central Illinois golf courses.

The mission of Kennedy’s creation is: “to provide central Illinois junior golfers and their families an affordable, competitive tour where junior golfers can sharpen their skills for the approaching summer and fall seasons.”

Entry fee for The Prep Tour is $33 for an 18-hole event; $65 for a two-day event. In an era of three- and four-digit participation and entry fees, those prices are refreshing even if there are no fancy scoreboards or tee gifts.

Kennedy told me at a recent event that he wants his tour to service central Illinois. He said while Chicago-area golfers are welcome, they are not his focus.

His central Illinois tour has stops not only in the Journal Star circulation area like Macomb, but Quincy, Gibson City, Tuscola, Springfield, Decatur, Bloomington-Normal and Mahomet.

The Prep Tour’s multi-day events are ranked by the Junior Golf Scoreboard, a nationwide scoring system college coaches can access to verify scores.

Next season, Kennedy said he is looking to add more two-day events and perhaps expand into the Quad-City area. He added a college division for the final event this season in Macomb and hopes to do more with that division next year.

And what impressed me the most is that Kennedy starts each group, and takes the time after the tournament to shake hands with the competitors and thank them for playing.

Sean, keep up the outstanding work.

Bo Ryan covers golf for the Journal Star. He can be reached at 686-3214 or rryan@pjstar.com.