The cream of India’s amateur talent will be on display when the Tata Steel Inter-State Golf Championship 2014 tees off at the Par-71 Golmuri Golf Course here on Tuesday. This is the eighth leg of the Tata Steel Amateur Golf Tour season where a full field of 96 players will battle it out for winning 45 points on offer in the event to be played over four days of stroke play.
There are 27 State teams competing for supremacy to be crowned the best golfing state of the country. leading the competition front is Karnataka’s Udayan Mane, who narrowly missed out on an Asian Games Bronze Medal in Incheon by single stroke last week. Also in the fray is tour veteran Uttar Pradesh’s Simarjeet Singh who won at the Tata Steel Tamil Nadu Amateur a couple of months back.
As many as 7 of the top 10 OoM players are contending this week including reigning Eastern India Amateur Champion Arjun Sharma (No.6) of Uttar Pradesh, Samarth Dwivedi (No.4) who won the Southern India Amateur 2014 and Karnataka lads Syed Saqib Ahmed (No.8), Trishul Chinnappa (No. 9). Jharkhand’s challenge is led by Kurush Heerjee, Saurav Ghosh, Aditya Panchamiya and Rohit Kumar Bouri. Another local, Dhanpat Yadav warmed up with an ace on the 140 yard 5th hole and is part of team Jharkhand ‘C’.
Tata Steel, who have taken on the mantle of the title sponsors have truly added steel in the growth and development program of the game of golf. “ We are happy to play host to the prestigious event as a part of a very exciting ongoing season of the Tata Steel Amateur Golf Tour.” Said Farzan Heerjee, chief, sports and guest relations, Tata Steel.
“We are pleased that our efforts have resulted in producing and nurturing some exceptional talent and we hope to further grow the Tour in the coming seasons.” added Farzan. The 6194 yards long Golmuri Golf Course is a golfer’s delight and the undulations and the strategically placed bunkers along with water hazards presents golfers with different challenges every time they tee off.
The Golmuri Golf Course is characterized by numerous electric pylons, which provide different angles of approach to the golfer along with 1,939 clock tower near the 8th tee.