The Sergio García Foundation reports that it has donated all the funds raised (€123,116.39) at the Andalucía Valderrama Masters to Madrid’s Hospital Universitario La Paz, to support an interior design project aimed at humanising the X-ray unit in the children's area.
The unit will be redesigned into a welcoming, bright and relaxing environment through the choice of appropriate materials, colours and images. In addition to caring for individuals, the project is environmentally friendly, as the improved lighting system will result in a 60 per cent saving in power consumption.
“We are all very excited with this project, which is an area of real need,” said Javier Cobas, children and maternal hospital deputy manager. “We have invested in equipment recently, but we lack infrastructure, and children must also be separated from adults.
“The renovation will take about three months since we cannot stop our activity. Our children’s hospital, considered as number one in Europe, is well equipped with 240 beds and receives 9,000 patients per year, as the only hospital that can provide all medical and surgical specialties, allowing all types of paediatric transplants to be performed.”
García set up his charitable foundation in 2002 “for the purpose of contributing to the social inclusion of economically-deprived children through social assistance benefits and the practice of sport as free-time activity”. The foundation supports, on a regular or an occasional basis, a large variety of NGOs and humanitarian associations.
Through his foundation, the Spanish star has been one of the key drivers of Spanish adaptive golf. Together with the Deporte y Desafío Foundation, they have conducted 23 adaptive golf clinics throughout Spain attended by more than 700 disabled persons.
The third edition of the Andalucía Valderrama Masters was held in October at Royal Valderrama Golf Club, where Garcia secured his third win during a season that also included the fulfilment of a career ambition by winning his maiden major title at the U.S. Masters.
“Winning the Andalucía Valderrama Masters was an incredible feeling; I’m still over the moon. It was a great event for many reasons: Valderrama is one of my favourite courses, I played really well and felt confident, kept patient and waited for my chances. Joost (Luiten) played unbelievable and did not make it easy for me, and the support from the spectators was awesome.
“When I was presented with the project of humanising the X-ray unit, I really liked the idea. I am very happy because we have contributed to make a dream come true for the patients and their families, through the event and my foundation”.
Antonio García, Sergio’s uncle and responsible for the foundation, presented the cheque to doctors Javier Cobas, Rafael Pérez-Santamarina, María Pilar Moreno Anaya and Gonzalo Garzón, and nursing director Esther Rey and Eduardo López Collazo, director of the research institute.
The Andalucía Valderrama Masters was sponsored by the Andalucian regional government, with the support of Rolex, Volvo, Solán de Cabras, Heineken and Osborne.
