September 26, 2003	Friday	Rajab 28, 1424

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)

LAHORE, Sept 25: Country’s top professionals, amateurs, ladies and seniors will take part in the Bank Al falah-Quaid-i-Azam Open golf championship-54 holes which will be tee- off at the Lahore Gymkhana golf course from Friday.

There will be 105 professionals, 95 amateurs, 14 ladies and 40 seniors to compete at Lahore Gymkhana in the three-day event.

A total cash prize of Rs 250,000 will be at stake. The winner will receive Rs 41,200. Besides it special prize of a car for hole-in-one on par-3 whether at hole No 8, 14 or 18 is also on offer.

The event for professionals has been included for the first time as in the past it was confined to amateurs only.

Top stars Shabbir Iqbal (Islamabad), Matloob Ahmed (Lahore Gymkhana), Mohammad Munir (Islamabad), Imdad Hussain (Lahore Garrison), Muhammad Tariq (Islamabad), Tahir Naseem, Abbas Ali, Mohammad Akram (Lahore Gymkhana), Mohammad Siddique (Faisalabad) and Akhtar Ali (Lahore Gymkhana) are competing in the professional event.

In the amateur section, prominent golfers like Shahid Javed Khan (Nowshera), Tariq Mehmood (Islamabad), Vaqas Ahmad (Rawalpindi), Waseem Rana (Defence Karachi), Sameer Iftikhar, Adil Jehangir and Mir Maaz Mahmood (Gymkhana) are contesting for the honours.

Shahid, Tariq and Vaqas were the members of the national golf team which performed well in the Asia Pacific Amateur Golf team Championship in Australia by taking fourth position.

Dr Aimal Zaman was the fourth playing member of the team. The professional and amateurs events are to be held on all the three days while ladies and seniors will play 36-holes (two-day) and 18-holes (one-day). The utility prizes for the best three net, gross and of each day of the amateurs, seniors and ladies events, will also be on offer.

Lahore Gymkhana golf course captain, Karamatullah Chaudhary said that the course was in excellent condition and had 55 bunkers and four water hazards and 8 holes where there was every likelihood of the golfer hitting a shot out of bounds and thereby getting penalised.

The course is 6666 yards long with 37 going out and 35 coming in.