KLGCC ready to host Maybank Malaysian Open

The newly refurbished West Course of the Kuala Lumpur Golf & Country Club will get its biggest test come March 4-7 when it hosts for the second time, the jointly sanctioned Maybank Malaysian Open.

The West Course was the venue five years ago in the first year of Maybank’s five-year sponsorship deal. However, the course was in disappointing shape and the greens especially looked diseased to the eyes of television viewers.

All that has changed. With more than RM100 million spent by its owners Sime Darby Group, the West Course has undergone quite an amazing transformation. The course has been re-turfed, with Seashore Paspalum on its fairways and Paspalum Supreme on its greens giving the whole course a strikingly greener look.

Trees have been added alongside fairways that will provide for more accuracy off the tees. A lot of landscaping works have been done to beautify the course. One may be forgiven if wondering you’re at Augusta National when standing at the teebox of the par 4 second hole and looking down towards the white bunkers, fairway, pond on the left and a well-guarded green with trees and flowers in the background.

The main test is always the greens. Professionals always look forward to faster, truer greens with speeds of at least 10 on the stimp meter. With renovations to the course completed, it is now a matter of allowing the new turf to grow in. KLGCC general manager Ding Meng Sieng is confident they will get speeds of at least 10.5 to 11.

The layout of the West Course remains the same. But KLGCC’s other 18, the East Course, underwent a complete transformation under the guidance of course architect Ted Parslow. The original designs of both the East and West were by Singapore-based Nelson and Haworth. But the East has been completely remodelled and opens this month while the West is closed in preparation for the Open.

Golf fans yet to play at the West or East course since the renovations, are in for a pleasant surprise. Even the fully automated driving range has been given a makeover. The clubhouse has also been completely renovated and now has the look and feel of a 6-star establishment.

Malaysia Gears Up

Danny Chia will be gunning to finally win the Malaysian Open after having led for two rounds in 2008 at Kota Permai and 2009 at Saujana last year

Since its inception in 1962 no Malaysian has won the Open. Sime Darby initiated a gruelling four-weeks training programme last month for the six Malaysians who will be teeing up, namely Danny Chia, Iain Steel, S. Siva Chandran, Shaaban Hussin, Ben Leong and Airil Rizman.

To provide technical expertise not just physically but mentally as well, Sime Darby hired Andrew Nicholson, the senior director of instruction for IMG. They also gave the six players the right to use the playing and recreational facilities of the club.

Five other Malaysians qualified for the Open after a 36-hole shootout at the West Course. Anis Helmi Hassan emerged top after finishing with even par 144. The other four who will join him for a shot at the US$2 million total purse are P. Gunasegaran, M. Sasidaran, Akhmal Tarmizie and Shukree Othman who all tied with a five-over 149.

Of all the local professionals, Gunasegaran has come closest to bagging the trophy after losing out to Swede Joakim Haegmann in an epic eight-hole play-off at the Royal Selangor Golf Club in 1994. Since then, Chia has taken most of the attention by leading after two rounds in 2008 and 2009.

Gunasegaran, who has been in the shadows of Chia, Leong and Airil the past few years, seems to be finding some of his old form when he finished joint 36 in the Asian Tour Qualifying School at Hua Hin, Thailand last month. It ensures he will get to play in most of the Asian Tour events.

Ben Leong with his father-caddy. Leong won the Selangor Worldwide Masters at Seri Selangor two years ago.

This promises to be a big year for our professionals. With the help of the Sports Ministry, the

ailing Malaysian Professional Golfers’ Association was de-registered on Dec 23 and the formation of a new association is on the horizon. The government’s involvement will see an injection of funds and the birth of a new national tour.

The biggest shout however goes to entrepreneur Tan Sri Lee Kim Yew and the US PGA in formalising a historic US PGA sanctioned event at the Mines Resort later this year. Called the Asia Pacific Golf Classic, the 40-man event will carry US$6 million in prize money, which will make it one of the three biggest golf tournaments in Asia, alongside the HSBC Champions in Shanghai event and the Barclays Singapore Open.

The top 25 players from the PGA Tour’s final FedEx Cup standings automatically qualify for the event which means a strong possibility of the world’s top 25 players heading to Kuala Lumpur. They will be joined by the top 10 available players from the Asian Tour’s Order of Merit.

The remaining five spots will be given out as sponsor exemptions with at least one place for a Malaysian professional. The tournament will be part of the 2010 PGA Tour late-season calendar as also the US$40 Asian Tour.

The Asian Tour has seven co-sanctioned tournaments with the European Tour each year and one of them is held in Europe in Switzerland. The Asian Tour also has a co-sanctioned event with Japan. Apart from the Maybank Malaysian Open and the Asia Pacific Golf Classic, two other Asian Tour events hosted in Malaysia are the Iskandar Johor Open and the Selangor Worldwide Masters.

Since the inception of the Asian Tour, only Leong, Airil and Chia have recorded victories in the Selangor Worldwide Masters, Pakistan Masters and Taiwan Open respectively.

It is learnt that Tan Sri Lee, through the promoters of the Asia Pacific Golf Classic, has signed a six-year deal with the US PGA. Meanwhile it is understood that Maybank will sign a new title sponsorship deal with Global One, the promoters of the Malaysian Open.

Past winners of the Malaysian Open