Lee joins pro rankings

Min Woo Lee was an exemplary international representative for Australia.

The Min Woo Lee from Perth will take his highly anticipated professional dive this week.

The 20-year-old, Australia's top-ranked amateur of the past 18 months, will leave the world rankings at a career number 5 without a professional card, but with a busy 2019 scheduled as he aims to achieve one or more.

Lee hopes to release exemptions early in the European Tour schedule and makes his professional debut during the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship, part of the prestigious Rolex series of the tour.

The rhythmic right-handed, who has not made a secret of his long-term intention to play in the United States, also made a start in the Panama Championship on the Web in early February. Tour Tour in February

It is difficult to put a great effort into Lee's sparkling amateur career, since he has been a prominent artist at national and international level for the past three years

The long-standing member of Royal Fremantle, remarkably a six-year player of the state team for Western Australia, came to international fame when he became the first Australian to win the Junior Championship of the US Boys in Tennessee in 2016.

After having played more than a handful of professional tournaments, Lee reached the quarter finals of the European Tour last year, along with the approval of World Super 6 Perth.

He was prominently featured twice in the Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship and was an important member of several Australian and international teams, including last year's World Amateur Teams Championship in Ireland, where he was sixth individual. He also played in the Nomura Cup and was a big part of the 2018 Asia-Pacific team that won the Bonallack trophy for the first time in 14 years from Europe

"The time is now," said Lee.

"People have been asking me for a while, but I have proven to myself that I can compete at the highest level and my team and I feel that there are good opportunities.

"I went through the first two phases of Web Q-School and just missed my card in the final phase, so I'm going to play against the pro's knowing that I can participate.

"For that, I have been very grateful to everyone who helped me to reach this stage, especially my coach Ritchie Smith, physio Martin McInnes and power and conditioning coach Jordan Stares, and I also want everyone at Golf Western Australia and the high-performance thanking team and others at Golf Australia who have had their backs in recent years

"It was a great ride and I can not wait for the next chapters about the next stage, wherever they are."

Brad James, general manager of golf Australia, said Lee, who had been a benchmark athlete in 2018, was exemplary throughout his amateur career.

"We are delighted to see the Min Woo transition to his professional career – he has done some extraordinary things," James said.

"His high-performance team in WA has given him tremendous development opportunities and we are convinced that he will continue to use these lessons and all our support during the transition to professional golf.

"He has had great success at the amateur level and we look forward to becoming part of his journey in the future."