Australasian chances good in Athens
BY Bruce Young | Nationwide Tour | 2009 Athens Regional Foundation Classic | Preview | 16 Apr 2009
The Nationwide Tour gets back to business this week when the Athens Regional Foundation Classic is played at the Jennings Mill Golf Club in Bogart, just outside of Athens in Georgia.
The Nationwide Tour had a week off while the Masters was being played but returns with Australian Michael Sim in firm command of the number one money list position. With US$182,000 Sim needs what appears to be only US$40,000 or so away from a 2010 PGA Tour card but given his current form he is clearly aiming higher than that. This will be Sim’s first visit to the Robert Cupp designed layout.
The tournament is being played for the fourth occasion and two of its three previous winners, Paul Gow and defending champion Robert Damron are in this week’s field.
Sim deserves to be the favourite given his consistent run of results of late including his fine win at the TPC San Francisco earlier this month but with all six winners on this year’s Nationwide Tour in the field this week the competition promises to be hot.
Steve Alker and Alistair Presnell, who won the Moonah Classic and New Zealand PGA events during the Nationwide Tour’s down-under swing make their first US appearance for the season with both well positioned to advance their cause in the quest for PGA Tour status.
Other Australasians include Gavin Coles, Mark Hensby, Steve Allan, Cameron Percy, Andrew Buckle, Ewan Porter, previous winner of this event, Paul Gow, Grant Waite and Phil Tataurangi.
Hensby plays his first event of 2009, in fact his first since the Children’s Miracle Network Classic in Florida in early November. He is still fighting to regain the form that saw him as one of the leading Australians on the PGA Tour in 2005 prior to a car crash in March of 2006 and is at present without status on the PGA Tour.
