‘European Tour 2nd stage qualifying – LAS COLINAS’
For those of you that may not be aware during the last week the European tour stage 2 qualifying event was held at the exclusive Las Colinas Golf & Country Club which is located here on the Costa Blanca. The next stage from this event is final qualifying where the successful few will gain a card onto the main tour to play against the worlds best golfers including and our Ryder Cup team members so the rewards are great. This year I have had the opportunity to play with Jack Burke and Luke Goddard both of whom were highly successful amateurs and who now ply their trade in the lower levels of professional golf on the Challenge & Ecco tours where they are lucky to break even at the end of the year, Now you should understand that these are hugely talented golfers who were +4 handicap amateurs and members of the English and Walker Cup teams and yet with the depth of talent in Europe they struggle to make a living. Most of us will know Las Colinas well but if you visited the course during the tournament you will have seen these ‘journeymen’ golfers taking the course to pieces over the 4 days with the winning score of Chris Paisley of -17 followed by Sam Walker on -14 and Jaime Elson on -12 and would you believe that a score of -6 failed to gain one of the 17 spots available for qualification. Let’s put that into perspective in that an average score of 69 shots over a four day period FAILED to qualify and this included former tour regulars as Raymond Russell, Zane Scotland and Scott Drummond. Just how good are these guy’s to still be considered journeymen!
The good news for our golfing region is that the Las Colinas course was well presented and appreciated by the golfers and the organisers so the chances are they will return next year so take the opportunity to visit the course during the event and see how golf should really be played.