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Royal Harare Golf Club....ready to host the re-launch of Zimbabwe Open

The ZIMBABWE OPEN GOLF TOURNAMENT makes a welcome return on the Zimbabwe and Sunshine Tour calendar this year after a nine year absence. The Zimbabwe Open Golf Tournament was last run in this country in the year 2001 and had remained suspended since the last tournament because of numerous challenges faced after the general deterioration of the Zimbabwean economy and social environment. The re-launch is set for Thursday, 4 February 2010 at Royal Harare Golf Club. Invitations have been extended to media, sports personalities, golfers, golf club captains and the business community to witness the event.

The 2010 Zimbabwe Open Tournament will be held at Royal Harare Golf Club during the week commencing Sunday 18 April through to the final day of the tournament on Saturday 24 April 2010. The relevant pre- qualifying games and the traditional pro-am tournaments will be held during this period culminating in the final professional tournament during the last four days of the week.

The Zimbabwe Golf Association (ZGA), in consultation with the relevant stakeholders including the Zimbabwe Professional Golfers Association (ZPGA), invited various business leaders and sports personalities to form a Committee with a mandate to run the Zimbabwe Open Golf Tournament in an efficient and transparent manner that promotes sports business and goodwill amongst all stakeholders. The Zimbabwe Open Golf Committee 2010 (ZOGC) was born just before Christmas in December 2009.

The Zimbabwe Open Golf Committee 2010 (ZOGC) has set itself a target to raise a minimum of USD $250,000 which will cover the minimum Sunshine Tour prize money requirement of ZAR 1 million (R1,000) and other related Sunshine Tour expenses which the Committee undertakes to account for in full. Golfzone understands that the Committee is desirous to ensure that the Zimbabwe Open Golf Tournament is re-launched with a big bang and that entails putting together a prize money package that is tweaked above the minimum required by the Sunshine Tour.

The Zimbabwe Open is a golf tournament on the Sunshine Tour. It was first played in 1984 and was part of what was known as the Safari Tour, a collection of events in Africa that were played by professionals based on the European Tour during their winter. As a result, it became an event on the European based Challenge tour in 1991, where it remained for two seasons before moving onto the FNB Summer Tour, which became the Southern Africa Tour and later the Sunshine Tour.

As it was held in the weeks preceding the Nedbank Golf Challenge, the tournament attracted some of the world’s leading players, as they used it as a warm up to the big money invitational. Past winners include major winners Vijay Singh and Nick Price, who along with Mark McNulty is most successful player at the event, both men having recorded three victories.

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