Ballantine’s Championship

April 24th, 2009

There really is only one place to start with this week’s Blog and that is with a quick look back at last week’s Volvo China Open where Titleist ambassador Scott Strange emerged victorious. We felt compelled to mention Scott in last week’s post as he was showing such strong form during practice and it was great to see this form continue through the event. Scott saved his best for last as he carded a stunning final round 68 (-4) on Sunday, including three birdies in the final five holes, to take victory by a single shot. The tournament was Scott’s first event played with the new 2009 Pro V1 and it’s fair to say the switch yielded instant results. In addition to the new ball, Scott also trusted a full bag of Titleist equipment to claim his second career European Tour title, including the 909D2 driver and AP2 Forged irons.

Many congratulations to Scott from the Titleist team!!

This week’s event takes us to South Korea’s Jeju Island and the magnificent Pinx Golf Club for the Ballantine’s Championship, an event tri-sanctioned by the European Tour, Asian Tour and Korean PGA Tour. Another cosmopolitan field is punctuated by a number of big names which includes European Tour stalwart Lee Westwood, yet another player to have recently made the switch to the new Titleist Pro V1x.

Click here to view the slide show.

As you’d expect, the field has a strong South Korean representation and one of the most notable names is young Titleist Ambassador Seung-Yul Noh. Noh is the newest addition to the worldwide team of Titleist ambassadors and is undoubtedly one of the hottest prospects in Asian golf following a hugely successful debut season on the Asian Tour in 2008. A maiden Tour victory, three runners-up finishes and six top-tens in just 16 starts is a hugely impressive season for any player, but is even more outstanding when you consider that this all came from a 17-year old rookie!! We will watch Noh with great interest in the coming years as he looks to build on his strong start to professional golf and, at the time of writing, things are certainly going well at the Ballantine’s Championship with Noh well positioned in a tie for 13th at four under par.

Titleist ambassador Branden Grace has also made a strong start to the event lying in a tie for 7th at the halfway stage. It is no surprise to see Branden playing well following a strong top 20 finish at last week’s event and he was certainly in confident mood as he chatted with our South African Tour Representative Leonard Loxton earlier in the week. Branden has been a regular feature on the Tour Blog over recent weeks having made a few equipment changes, including a switch to the new 2009 Pro V1x, and these changes seem to be paying dividends. Branden’s game is in fine shape at present and it would be no surprise to see him contend for the title this weekend.

Next week the European Tour heads back to mainland Europe for the Open de Espana at the PGA Golf de Catalunya resort in Girona, Spain. Having been absent from the last two events the Titleist Tour Support Vehicle will be back in attendance giving the players an opportunity to work on their equipment needs. The team fully expect a number of players to take this opportunity and it promises to be another industrious week for the Titleist team. As usual, we will keep you up to speed on all the latest developments. Stay tuned for next weeks Blog!!

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