The world’s number one golf club, the Mission Hills Golf & Country Club, China, announced that one of the greatest team events outside the Ryder Cup and the President Cup, the World Cup of Golf, will be held at the Mission Hills Golf & Country Club in November for the next 11 years.

Last November, 28 countries sent their golf teams to participate in this event, with brilliant golf stars coming from all over the world fighting for the championship for their countries. Scottish players Mr. Colin Mont - gomerie and Mr. Marc Warren claimed the championship, and a total bonus of US$1.6 million. The happiest matter for the Chinese people is that Chinese golfers Mr. Zhang Lian Wei and Mr. Liang Wen Chong tied for 11th, marking a historical breakthrough for a Chinese team.

This event stimulated the golf industry in China, and more people are trying to start playing. Obviously, more coaches are in demand. I believe that our GTF members will act a more important part in the coming years in China.

The first three months have been a whirlwind of activity for the Great Britain and Ireland federation. In January, I visited the golf show in Orlando, and also took the time to travel down to meet Geoff and the team at headquarters. It was great to experience the hub of all our activities, and I would like to say a special thanks to Geoff for buying lunch!

The updated WGTFGB website will be 70 percent competed by the end of April. It has many dynamic features designed to not only promote the golf teaching profession, but offers a vehicle for those seeking to improve to find our coaches and know exactly how well-trained they are.

We also feature support for the proprietor, owner, and directors and managers of golf clubs as to why they should employ one of our coaches. We also feature a member’s only section, which will include loads of information and the ability to talk to others in the federation.

In an attempt to raise our brand awareness to an even higher level, we started an advertising campaign on a major TV golf channel in April and look forward to reporting the results in the summer.

We have been working with the European federations to improve our trainings and communication, and with that in mind, I attended a workshop with the Dutch GTF in April, and plan to attend the summit in July and the European Golf Teachers Cup in Austria in October.

We managed a coup at the UK golf show, held at Whittlebury Park this spring, by supplying the event with free coaching to the public. This is a great way of extending our brand awareness as well as a fantastic opportunity for our coaches to practice their skills. We will also be exhibiting at the London, Ireland, and Welsh golf shows golf show.

Without doubt this will be our most exciting year to date. Good luck everyone.

In the last few years, golf has been on the rise in India, along with a number of professionals increasingly doing well on the Asian and European Tours. With this, the demand for qualified teaching professionals has also been on the rise, and the IGTF has an important role to play in initiating golfers to take up teaching golf as a profession.

With this in view, we shall be organizing the Level III and IV course during the week of May 25-31, 2008. The All India Golf Teaching Pro tournament, “The IGTF Cup,” is also scheduled for October 18-19, 2008, at the Eagleton Golf Resort, Bangalore. This is the only event in the country for teaching pros with cash prizes, and has seen a very good response in the past. With the rise of golfing activity in the country, there is a shortage of good and qualified teaching professionals, and the IGTF is making great strides in bridging this gap.

Dubai Sports City (DSC), the cornerstone project of Dubailand, is a USD $4 billion, 50 million square feet mixed-use development which will be the world’s first integrated purpose-built sports city.

The development will be built around five major sports venues:

• A 60,000 capacity multi-purpose outdoor stadium for football, rugby, track and field and other sports and non-sports events;

• A 10,000 seat multi-purpose indoor arena suitable for all hard court sports as well as concerts and other events and also including a removable ice rink;

• A 25,000 capacity cricket stadium, expandable to 30,000, with state-of-the-art facilities for players, match officials, VIPs, spectators and the media;

• A 5,000 seat field hockey stadium;

• A 72-par, 18-hole championship golf course designed by South African star Ernie Els.
  In addition to the stadia, Dubai Sports City will feature a series of major sports academy facilities including:

• A Dubai Sports City Football Academy, the home of Manchester United Soccer Schools, Dubai;

• A David Lloyd Tennis Academy;

• A Butch Harmon School of Golf, the first such facility outside the United States;

• The International Cricket Council’s own ICC Global Cricket Academy;

• The World Hockey Academy, a first of its kind partnership with the International Hockey Federation;

• Top class multi-sport training facilities including gymnasium and a 50-meter swimming pool;

• A world-renowned sports medicine and rehabilitation centre.
  Designed as a lifestyle development, Dubai Sports City will also feature comprehensive community facilities including:

• Next Generation Country Club and spa facility;

• A large-scale shopping mall;

• Two retail hubs offering upscale dining and boutique shopping;

• A range of schools;

• Medical facilities;

• Community centers;

• Hotels.

European Tour and Ryder Cup Star Henrik Stenson visited The Els Club at Dubai Sports City this past February  11. The world’s number 13-ranked player cleverly negotiated the Ernie Elsdesigned championship course, eagling the first hole on his way to a subpar practice round. Stenson is flanked by Thomas Rubi, Els Club GM (left) and Mark Chapleski, Area MD of Troon Golf (right).

It’s not every day that one gets the opportunity to meet a living legend and particularly in the field that they love. Since February, I have been working in conjunction with the Australian GTF at the beautiful tropical Port Douglas in Queensland. We have preferred-teacher status at the Mirage Country Club, which is a Peter Thomson/Michael Wolveridge course first developed in the mid 1980’s. It was an icon for its time in Australia and still has a beautiful charm about it, but is in need of some TLC.

Plans are in place for a significant up - grade, and hopefully by being on the ground the AGTF can secure the rights to establish an academy for overseas and local students. Establishing a presence in a holiday resort hasn’t been easy and has required a lot of networking with the locals, and there are positive signs at this stage.

Anyway, enough of the background. The resort I am staying at (Plantation Resort) was recently host to a group of dialysis-dependant people who are able to travel through the services of a mobile dialysis team called Dialysis Escape Line. What a great idea! I have become friends with the owner, who is a fanatical golfer. He has been a great help introducing me to the local business fraternity, etc.

One evening whilst consuming a couple of coldies around the pool bar, he sidled over with a couple who had just had dinner and introduced them to me. They turned out to be one of the leading world golf journalists, Tom Ramsey, and his lovely wife Carmel. Tom has been working for the Aussie business icon Rupert Murdock of News Ltd., covering 140 majors over 35 years, and I guess numerous other topics. He also authored 12 books, including Great Australian Golf Courses, The Golf Courses of Hawaii, and The World of Golf.

There was an instant connection because of our love for golf. It never ceases to amaze me how a common interest for golf is such an ice-breaker wherever you go. We talked for a while about many golf subjects, and in particular Tom’s experiences, which are fascinating. As you can well imagine, his knowledge of the word golf stage is comprehensive.

While he was here, I had the pleasure of partnering him in a two-ball ambrose at the Sea Links Resort, which is another Thomson/ Wolveridge course. It was the first time Tom had played 18 holes in six years, and boy did he play well. We managed to clean up the opposition on the 17th after allowing them – a stroke a hole from the turn. It was fun and a real pleasure to share the cart with a legend.

After the round, we sat on the club balcony and talked about golf in general. Tom related many great stories, but the one that struck me most was his first meeting with Ben Hogan, and I thought at the time lots of golfers would be interested in his story. Tom has kindly given me his permission to share it with you:

It was 1972, the year the US Open was at Pebble Beach. Tom read in the Chronicle that Hogan was staying and playing at the Olympic Club in San Francisco. Tom called him and the conversation went something like this:

“Is that Mr Hogan?”
“Yes.”
“My name is Tom Ramsey. I am from Australia and here to cover the US Open for my newspaper. Any possibility of a game with you?”
Long silence.
“Why should I play with you?” came the reply.
“Well you have never been to Australia and everyone has seen Follow The Sun. I’m sure my readers would enjoy a story about meeting and playing with you.”
“Do you play golf?”
“Yes.”
“Well, meet me on the practice putting green tomorrow morning, 9 AM,” said Hogan.
When Tom’s taxi pulled into the clubhouse, a pro came up and said, “You the guy who called Hogan?”
Tom nodded yes.
He’s on the first tee waiting for you.”
Tom duly met the legend and was invited to hit off. They each parred the first two holes, and now they were standing on the elevated par-three tee. Tom hit a 2-iron to six feet.
At that point Hogan walked over to him, shook his hand and said, “You can call me Ben.”
Tom recalls that Hogan shot 69 and he a 75.
Afterwards, Hogan told Tom if he was ever in Fort Worth, drop into Shady Oaks and have another game. Three years later, Tom was in Dallas, and he and a friend drove to Shady Oaks. Hogan was on the  practice tee.
Tom stood about 30 feet away. Hogan paused from practice and looked back at Tom. He then hit a few more balls and stared at Tom again.
“Have you the clubs in the trunk?” Hogan asked.
“Yes,” said Tom.
“Get them, see you at the first tee,” he said.
They met once again after that – at Shady Oaks – this time for nine holes.
“It was quite an experience,” said Tom. “I was young at the time and wet behind the ears. I didn’t know you were not supposed to call Ben Hogan. I’m glad I did.”
As I mentioned earlier in this article, it’s rare to have the opportunity to meet a legend, but to meet one who has played with one of the greats is special, and I will cherish my chance meeting with Tom Ramsey.
Some more bragging rights to add to my kit-bag!!
My thanks to Tom for sharing this story with us, and I hope that we get the opportunity to catch up again. Hopefully, it will be on the golf course, when I will insist that he is my partner.

Des Heffernan, Level IV Master Teaching Professional ® (Mirage Country Club), Port Douglas, Queensland, Australia.

Dear WGTF members,
For the first time in our history, we have organized a seminar for our members, which we want to be a yearly event. We called it the Second Month Seminar, because we want to do it every year in February.

And lucky us…Mr. Geoff Bryant himself, who was on a trip in Europe, was willing to open this seminar! It was a great opportunity for our members to meet the founder of the WGTF. The three-day seminar was a great success. We had three parallel workshops, with Mr. Tom Wartelle doing a refresher course on “Teaching Golf” and “Improve your own Swing.” Mr. Arno Hovius, who is a physiotherapist and golf teacher, showed us the insights of the biomechanics of the swing. We also had Mr. Neil Bates and Mr. Ignace Adriaanse doing high-level clubfitting. We had a tremendous turn-out as you can see from the photograph and what a great time we all had.

I wanted to share this success story with all of you , maybe as an idea for your own federation.

It has been a long winter for our members in Canada, but spring is finally here, approximately two weeks later than last year. However, the golf spirit never sleeps, and our members are getting ready for another great season of golf.

CANADIAN GOLF TEACHERS CUP
We are pleased to announce that the Canadian Golf Teachers Cup will be held this year at Crosswinds Golf & Country Club in Burlington, Ontario. Many of our members had the opportunity to play this course in 2006, and were impressed with the layout and challenge of this facility. In response to the requests of many of our members, we will be holding this tournament over a two-day period, September 7-8. Callaway Golf, Mizuno, and Jazz Golf will be on hand during the event to show their products to our members.

To register for this event, please visit our website at www.cgtf.com.

ALBERTA NEWS
A special thank you to a few of our members in Calgary, Alberta – Jeremy Dueck, Fred Cowley, Tim Crough, and Bob Taverner – who volunteered their time to work the Alberta Golf Show in early spring this year. Attendance was up from previous years, and there was a great interest in our booth and our certification courses.

CGTF members in Western Canada had a regional meeting to discuss and plan a one-day 36-hole tournament to be held this summer at Kananaskis Golf Club, in the heart of the Canadian Rockies. This event is confirmed for July 16, 2008. For details on this event, please contact Fred Cowley at fred@aceclubworks.com or Tim Crough at tcgolf@shaw.ca .

UPGRADING YOUR SKILLS
This year we are offering a unique opportunity to our associate members to assist them in upgrading their membership to Level III (fully-certified golf teaching professional). This will be a three-day prep school to help associate members lower their scores to reach the  playing requirements set for the Level III status. Leading this course will be Master Golf Teaching Professional Bill Bath. Bill has certified hundreds of golf teaching professionals in Canada over the past six years. For more information on this unique opportunity, please contact our office at 1-905-849-7254, or toll free 1-866-362-2483.

MOVING UP
On another note, CGTF Master Teaching Professional Jeff Howe has earned a new position as the golf academy director at Rockway Glen, close to his hometown of St. Catharine’s, Ontario. Also moving up from a head professional position, CGTF Master Teaching Professional Marc Ray is moving to Wasaga Beach, Ontario, to become the general manager of golf operations at two golf courses. Marc has been a member of the CGTF since 2001. We wish Jeff and Marc all the best in their new positions and all of our members a good golfing season.