First to grab opportunity in golf cleaning up (8)

I believe the answer is:

grooming

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'cleaning up' is the definition.
Although both the answer and definition are present participle verbs, I don't understand how one could define the other.

'first to grab opportunity in golf' is the wordplay.
'first to' says to take the initial letters.
'opportunity' becomes 'room' (room or space to do something).
'golf' becomes 'g' (phonetic alphabet: alpha, bravo, charlie etc.).
The first letter of 'grab' is 'g'.
'g'+'room'+'in'+'g'='GROOMING'

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