Gold Coast to host Masters Invitational
IN: News | Australian Seniors | Australian Masters Invitational (2008) | General | by Bruce Young | 22 Aug 2008
One of the most significant golf events on the sport’s Gold Coast calendar has today been announced to tee off on the Gold Coast later this year.
The inaugural $100,000 Greater Building Society’s Australian Masters Invitational will be held at the Emerald Lakes Golf Club between November 5 and 8 and will feature high profile Australian players Ian Baker-Finch, Graham Marsh, Rodger Davis and Bob Shearer.
The PGA endorsed four-days-of-golf, adds to the long list of past and present high-profile events on the Gold Coast including the ANZ Ladies Masters and will also incorporate the highly popular Daikin Night Shootout on Thursday November 6th.
The tournament continues an association with the staging of professional golf tournaments by local developer Nifsan, owners of the Emerald Lakes Golf Club and creators of the highly successful neighbouring Emerald Lakes master planned community. Emerald Lakes Golf Club played host to the Queensland PGA Championship between 2003 and 2007.
Nifsan director, Leslie Lord, says the innovative new golf tournament promises to be an outstanding opportunity for Gold Coast golf fans to witness senior golf at its best.
“Our association with the Queensland PGA Championship over the last five years has proved highly popular and of benefit to both Emerald Lakes and the wider golfing community on the Gold Coast as a whole,” Mr Lord says
“This year’s event is a new direction for the tournament and our ongoing involvement in events-based golf is a great source of pride and pleasure for the company and the Emerald Lakes team.
“With the inclusion of such high profile golfing names and sponsors it promises to be an exciting week of golf and should prove to be another highlight on the Queensland golfing calendar.”
While an event essentially restricted to ‘senior’ or ‘over 50’s golfers, 48 year old Baker-Finch’s place in the field comes via a sponsor’s invitation, allowing the Queenslander to test his tournament skills for the first time in since 2001, and his involvement offers the event a major drawcard.
Seventeen years after his victory at the Open Championship at Royal Birkdale, Baker-Finch remains a significant figure in the game courtesy of his involvement as one of golf’s leading golf commentators in his role with the CBS and TNT Networks.
“I’m really looking forward to the opportunity of coming back to the Gold Coast, to catch up with some friends and to enjoy what promises to be a really good event,” said Baker-Finch.
“It’s also good to support this event in its initial year as I feel sure it will be the first of many. I’m also keen to see how I will perform in a competitive situation once again but I don’t expect to take ten years off from tournament golf and come back and win against some of those who are in the field and who are playing tournament golf on a regular basis.
“I would eventually, though, like to play a few events on the Champions Tour when I turn 50 in just over two years and this gives me a chance to see where I am with my game and how I would go under a little more pressure than I experience in my normal social games over here in the USA.
“I’ve played Emerald Lakes previously back in 1998 when they opened the revised layout and have fond memories of it. From what I can recall of that event they produced the golf course in great shape then and by all accounts the course had continued to improve.”
The tournament will be played over 54 holes when 72 players will tee it up with their amateur partners in the pro-am format on the opening two days. A cut will then be made with the leading 36 players making it through to the final round on Saturday November 8th. A first prize of $30,000 plus a brand new golf cart supplied by Yamaha awaits the winner.
The Emerald Lakes Golf Club is an integral component in the multi-million dollar adjacent Emerald Lakes development. With the new Town Centre nearing completion and the French Quarter now under construction, the event provides the opportunity to further showcase the outstanding facilities being established in what has become the centre of the Gold Coast.
Another drawcard player, Graham Marsh, is a winner of nearly 70 events in the US, Europe, Japan, Asia and Australasia.
Marsh’s association with Emerald Lakes extends beyond just a playing interest, with his Gold Coast based golf course design company, Graham Marsh Golf Design, responsible for the redevelopment of the course in the late 1990’s into one of the most ‘in demand’ courses on the coast.
Rodger Davis and Bob Shearer are both previous Australian Open Champions and both have won extensively in Australia and internationally.
The Daikin Night Shootout, played under lights over nine holes and involving ten players, will rotate around the four holes closest to the Emerald Lakes Golf Club’s clubhouse, an innovation introduced last year and which proved so popular in bringing a new dynamic to the already popular event.
Last year Lucas Parsons was forced to pull out all stops to defeat the brilliant teenager Amy Yang at the final hole. Parsons will be back to defend his title while Amy Yang is now playing on the Ladies European Tour where she has already won two events in 2008.
This year’s field for the Daikin Night Shootout will again include a leading lady golfer with event organisers looking to finalise just who that might be in the next few weeks. Leading players participating in the Australian Masters Invitational will also feature in the event.
Total purse for the Daikin Night Shootout is $15,000 with a first prize of $6000 to the last man (or woman) standing at the completion of what promises to be another spectacular night of golf.
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