Friday, January 09, 2009

New Season for European Senior Tour

The European Senior Tour is set to break new ground in 2009 with 16 tournaments already confirmed as part of a schedule which will visit at least 11 different destinations over a ten month season. The historic inaugural Aberdeen Brunei Senior Masters presented by The Stapleford Forum, played over the Jack Nicklaus designed Empire Hotel and Country Club, is one of three new tournaments on the 2009 schedule and will launch the new season from February 27 to March 1. It is the first time Brunei has hosted a tournament on The European Tour, the European Senior Tour or the European Challenge Tour. Other new tournaments in 2009 are the Son Gual Mallorca Senior Open at Golf Son Gual, Mallorca, from May 8 -10, and the Benahavis Senior Masters at La Quinta Golf and Country Club, Spain, from October 2- 4. The Senior Open Championship presented by MasterCard will be played at Sunningdale Golf Club, Berkshire, from July 23-26, followed by the US Senior Open Championship at Crooked Stick Golf Club, Carmel, Indiana, from July 30 - August 2, with the first Senior Major Championship of the season, the US Senior PGA Championship, taking place from May 21-24 at the Canterbury Golf Club, Beachwood, Ohio. Aside from The Senior Open Championship, England will also host the De Vere Collection PGA Senior Championship, which returns to De Vere Slaley Hall in Northumberland for the second successive year from June 25-28, while the Travis Perkins plc Senior Masters at Woburn Golf Club and the Weston Homes PGA International Seniors at Stoke-by-Nayland Golf Club will both take place in September.
Those two tournaments follow the newly sponsored Cleveland Golf/Srixon Scottish Senior Open, which will take place at the Sam Torrance re-designed course at Fairmont St Andrews from August 21-23. Long term fixtures on the Senior Tour schedule are the DGM Barbados Open (March 18-20), which celebrates its tenth anniversary in 2009, the Jersey Seniors Classic (June 12-14), the Ryder Cup Wales Seniors Open (June 19-21) and the Bad Ragaz PGA Seniors Open (August 7-9), while the Casa Serena Open, in the Czech Republic, also returns to the schedule from September 18-20 after the success of the inaugural tournament in 2008. The season will end with the traditional finalé, the Senior Tour Championship, again taking place at the Club de Campo del Mediterráneo, in the Spanish region of Castellón, from November 6-8. It promises to be another exciting campaign for the Senior Tour with last season’s Number One Ian Woosnam set to face some stiff competition in defence of the John Jacobs Trophy from fellow Ryder Cup winning Captains Bernhard Langer and Torrance, as well as the Senior Tour’s all-time leading money winner Carl Mason and Peter Mitchell, a three-time winner in his maiden campaign last season. Andy Stubbs, Managing Director of the European Senior Tour, said: “Despite the difficult current economic climate which is affecting everyone at the moment, we are pleased to be announcing a strong and attractive 2009 European Senior Tour schedule. “We are optimistic the final list of tournaments will mirror the schedule of 2008 in terms of number of events and further announcements will be made once details are finalised. It is very encouraging that new tournaments have been added in Brunei, Mallorca and Spain and we very much appreciate the ongoing support of our existing Promoters and Sponsors, many of whom have been with us for a number of years now.”

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