Golf: Inaugural Kolar Open gets underway from Tuesday

Kolar (Karnataka), Aug 25 (IANS) Professional Golf Tour of India (PGTI), the official sanctioning body of professional golf in India announced the Kolar Open, will be held at the Zion Hills Golf County in Kolar, Karnataka, from August 26 to 29. The total prize purse for the event is Rs 1 crore.

With the staging of the Kolar Open, the PGTI makes its debut at the Zion Hills Golf County. The leading Indian professionals participating in the event include Angad Cheema, Olympian Udayan Mane, Om Prakash Chouhan, Manu Gandas, Arjun Prasad and Shaurya Bhattacharya, to name a few.

The prominent foreign names competing are Sri Lankans N Thangaraja and K Prabagaran, Bangladeshis Jamal Hossain and Badal Hossain, Italians Michele Ortolani and Federico Zucchetti, Czechia’s Stepan Danek, American Koichiro Sato, Nepal’s Subash Tamang as well as Uganda’s Joshua Seale.

Amandeep Johl, CEO, PGTI, said, “We are delighted to partner with Zion Hills Golf County in launching the inaugural Kolar Open as part of our continued efforts to expand the footprint of professional golf across India. We thank Zion Hills Golf County for their support to our endeavour of growing the sport and creating maximum playing opportunities for Indian professionals. With the recently-constructed back-nine of the course being unveiled for the first time, the golfing skills of India’s top professionals will be tested this week as the length of the course, the huge greens, the numerous penalty areas and the wind factor will pose a stiff challenge.”

George Menomparampil, managing director, Zion Hills Golf County, said, “We recently completed construction of the back nine holes at the course, and we are delighted to welcome the first Kolar Open PGTI tournament here - that carries Official World Golf Ranking Points. We look forward to an exciting contest and to offering players a memorable experience. It is our hope that this becomes a regular feature on the PGTI calendar and helps attract more golfers and tourists to the region.”

A challenging, championship-level 18-hole golf course designed by the legendary architect Ronald Fream forms the centrepiece at Zion Hills. Expansive granite shelves, rusty boulders and abundant lakes interweave with rolling greens to create a course that challenges experts and yet inspires learners, guaranteeing the mix of exhilaration and the indomitable spirit that makes golf such an addiction.

The two Pro-Am events played on Sunday, were won by the teams led by professionals Jamal Hossain and Varun Parikh. Jamal’s team won the morning session of the Pro-Am with a score of 52 and consisted of amateurs Advith Sunil, Rajagopal Koushik and Akhil Khorana. Varun’s team won the afternoon session of the Pro-Am with a score of 53.7 and consisted of amateurs Sandeep Syal, B K Nihal and Arnav Chatterjee.

--IANS

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