Tym Glaser, Associate Editor - SportTHE CARIBBEAN golfing community will celebrate a major milestone next week when the 50th Caribbean Amateur Golf Championships tee off at the Caymanas Golf and Country Club, in St. Catherine.
A series of functions have been planned around the four-day tournament, which starts on Wednesday, but most focus will be who's holding the major silverware on Saturday afternoon.
Regional powerhouse, Puerto Rico, who won all but one of the five categories, last year, in St. Kitts, and defending Hoerman Cup champions, Trinidad and Tobago look strong threats to walk away with the Arthur Ziadie Trophy for the overall best team, but hosts Jamaica, which have underachieved for a few years now, are also legitimate sectional and overall contenders.
Familiarity with the tricky course will be the trump card and that worked like a charm the last time the tournament was played here in 1996 as the hosts claimed the prized Hoerman Cup - their last hold of that crown.
All but two of the 14-member squad (Keith Stein and Dennis Atkinson) are based in Kingston and St. Andrew, and St. Catherine and for the bulk of the side, Caymanas is their home course.
Jamaica's Hoerman Cup team will face a tough task against T&T and a young Puerto Rican side, but through the experience of Owen Samuda and Michael Scott, the youth of Damion Spencer and emerging star, Fabian Campbell, plus Radcliff Knibbs, who was a selectors' choice because of his knowledge of the course, they can repeat the heroics of '96.
Professional coach, Jason Lopez, who has been working with the squad, believes the women's George Teale Trophy team is almost a certainty to win that section. Former Caribbean champion, Jodi Barrow, the venerable Maggie Lyn and young Tiffany Terrier lead the ladies' charge.
The men's over 35 and senior better ball duo also look to have legitimate title claims with former Hoerman Cupper, Stein, rejoining the international fray to partner rookie, Carl Bruce, in the Ramon Baez Trophy event, while Cup mainstay, John Smith, has now graduated to the senior circuit, where he will pair with another newcomer, George Hugh, in their dash for the Francis and Steele Perkins Trophy.
Another veteran stager, Atkinson, will anchor the super-seniors duo for the Higgs and Higgs Trophy. His partner is former Jamaica Golf Association president, Ossie Lee.
While the Caribbean will celebrate a significant milestone in regional amateur golf next week, the Jamaicans will be looking for much, much more.
Schedule of EventsTOMORROW: 8:00 a.m. - The Hoerman Classic - 50th Anniversary CAGC Commemorative tournament at CGCC. Teams arrive.
MONDAY: 7:00 a.m. - First practice round at CGCC. 7:00 p.m. - 50th Anniversary CAGC banquet at Jamaica Pegasus Hotel.
TUESDAY: 7:00 a.m. - Second practice round at CGCC. 8:00 a.m. - Constant Spring Golf Classic at Constant Spring Golf Club. 6:00: Opening ceremony at Cable and Wireless (C&W) National Golf Academy. 7:00 p.m. - President's cocktail reception.
WEDNESDAY: 7:00 a.m. - First round of CAGC at CGCC.
THURSDAY: 7:00 a.m. - Second round of CAGC at CGCC.
FRIDAY: 7:00 a.m. - Third round of CAGC at CGCC.
SATURDAY: 7:00 a.m. - Final round of CAGC AT CGCC. Awards ceremony after round at same venue. 8:00 p.m. Final night dinner party at C&W National Golf Academy.
SUNDAY: Teams depart
TEAMS
Bahamas
Barbados
Cayman
Dominican Republic
Jamaica
Organisation of Eastern
Caribbean States
Puerto Rico
Trinidad and Tobago
Turks and Caicos
U.S. Virgin Islands.
