•Madoya and Ngige made the cut during the Kenya Open and will be looking to continue in similar spirit and fashion
•This will be the first tournament for professional golfers after the 2019 Magical Kenya Open
Over 200 amateur golfers will play alongside 30 professionals in the second round of the KCB Road to the Masters Pro-Am tomorrow.
The Pro-Am will be preceded by the first round for pros today from 11:00 am at the par 71 Nyali Golf and Country Club. The Pro-Am will start at 09:30 am and will serve as the second and final round for pros.
Among the amateurs expected for the Pro-Am are handicap 4 William Kaguta, Ken Mwige playing off handicap 13, Taib Bajaber (handicap 11) and Evans Manono (handicap 9) and Gurbux Singh playing off handicap 4.
KCB Group’s marketing and communications director Angela Mwirigi said: “We are redefining golfing in Kenya by increasingly giving more opportunities to amateur and pro golfers across the country. We believe in growing sports talent for local and international competitions.”
While the pros will be shaping up for the Sunshine Tour, amateur golfers will be fighting for six slots available for each club at the Karen Masters. The six qualifiers will be the overall winner, wildcard (to be decided by the club), ladies winner, guest winner, staff winner and the men’s winner.
This will be the first tournament for professional golfers after the 2019 Magical Kenya Open at Karen Country Club two weeks ago. The pros, who missed the first leg of the five-event series held at Sigona Golf Club on February 25, will be playing 36 holes from today with the second round tomorrow to serve as a Pro-Am where they will be joined by amateur golfers from the coast region. Long-hitting Dismas Indiza and Muthaiga’s Greg Snow who both missed cut narrowly during the Magical Kenya Open will be among the golfers to watch.
Others are Golf Park’s David Wakhu, Riz Charania from Windsor, Royal Nairobi’s Eric Ooko, Simon Ngige of Thika Sports Club and the Great Rift Valley Golf Resort’s Justus Madoya. Madoya and Ngige made the cut during the Kenya Open and will be looking to continue in similar spirit and fashion.
The pros didn’t play in the opening round at Sigona as it coincided with the recently concluded Safari Tour. “We anticipate some good action in the Pro-Am where, pros and amateur will savour an 18 hole round. The course is playing really well at the moment. Whoever sticks to the fairways and hits the greens with precision will master the course,” said Nyali resident professional Nguguna Waweru, who is also playing in the event. Meanwhile, Charania is looking forward to Nyali with great expectations. Charania failed to master the Magical Kenya Open presented by ABSA and drifted to the bottom of the European Tour event.
But the Windsor resident professional said he is still in great shape and will go chasing results in today’s round one. “The Kenya Open provided extremely windy conditions. I have never been a wind player so it messed up my score,” said Charania, adding: “I’m looking forward to Nyali which is always a favourable hunting ground. I have always relished playing at see level.”
Charania won the last round of the Safari Tour on his home turf at Windsor.
“It will be exciting playing at Nyali again. We played the Safari Tour opener there last year and all was good. It’s really exciting that we are back in serious business a few days after the Kenya Open.”
Charania has been practicing hard since a poor two rounds at this year’s Kenya Open at Karen, where he failed to make the cut.