MICHAEL STEWART NOT NOW GOING TO ASIAN TOUR Q SCHOOL

Seven Scots bound for Thailand  

By COLIN FARQUHARSON 
Colin@scottishgolfview.com
The withdrawal of rookie pro Michael Stewart, pictured, formerly ranked the 12th best amateur in the world, leaves seven Scots bound for the two-part Asian Tour Qualifying School in Thailand.
Five of them, Greg Nicolson, Derek McKenzie, Graeme Stewart, Clarke Lutton and Lee Harper, the 1999 Scottish boys' match-play champion, have to survive a 72-hole pre-qualifier at three venues, Majestic Creek, Imperial Lakeview and Springfield Royal, fromn January 11 to 14.
There are over 440 entrants at this stage and only the top 20 percent after four rounds will go forward to the Final Stage from January 18 to 21.
Walker Cup hero James Byrne and Dubai-based Simon Dunn are able to skip the pre-qualifier as they are among the 150-odd exempt players who go straight into the 72-hole competition that willl decide the leading 40 (and ties) who will earn playing rights for the 2012 Asian Tour.
Stewart's Walker Cup team status would have put the 21-year-old from Ayrshire through to the Final Stage alongside Byrne and Dunn but he has decided to withdraw on the grounds that he is neither mentally nor physically in good enough shape to cope with the pressure and the heat and humidty which makes the Asian Tour Q School such a gruelling test for Europeans.
Stewart, who failed to advance past Stage 1 of the European Tour School and missed the cut at the Alps Tour School, is nursing a recurring wrist injury as well as trying to sort out a swing that served him so well in his amateur career but saw him shoot a pair of 79s to miss the cut on his pro debut in the Thailand Championship.
He will have eight starts on the Challenge Tour and also plans to play intermittently on the PGA EuroPro and Alps Tours.

BRITISH AND IRISH PLAYERS FOR ASIAN TOUR SCHOOL
FIRST STAGE
January 11 to 14 - 72 holes at three venues
Imperial Lakeview, Springfield Royal and Majestic Creek
Leading 20 per cent go forward to Final Stage
SCOTLAND
GREG NICOLSON
DEREK MCKENZIE
GRAEME STEWART
CLARKE LUTTON
LEE HARPER


ENGLAND
CHRIS GILL
CAE MENAI DAVIS
PETER FITZPATRICK
NICK PUGH
ANDREW BELL
WARREN GODDARD
PAUL GRANNELL
GUY WOODMAN
KEVIN TILBURY
LUKE BRIARS
NEIL REILLY
CHRIS CHAMBERLAIN
JAMES SHEFFIELD
PATRICK KELLY
NEIL CHAUDHURI
STEVE PARRY
CALUM MILLS
EMIKIEL TCHOBANIAN (amateur)
MATT DALEY (amateur)
LAWRENCE WARNE
GEORGE THACKER
DANIEL OWEN
MATTHEW HOUGH
IAN BROWN
SAM BRIARS
ALEX BELT
TED INNESKER
M DOWNES
JOEL NEALE
GRANT JACKSON
STEPHEN LEWTON
OLIVER BATES
RYAN ADAIR
LLEWELLYN MATTHEWS
BEN ANDREW
MARTYN PROCTOR
STEVEN SHARP


IRELAND
NIALL KEARNEY
STEPHEN GRANT
SHANE NOEL COMER


WALES
CHARLES DAVIES


FINAL STAGE
January 19 to 22: 72 holes at two venues (Springfield Royal and Imperial Lakeview)
Top 40 and ties gain playing rights on 2012 Asian Tour
ENGLAND
STEVE BROWN
PETER RICHARDSON
SIMON GRIFFITHS
MILES TUNNICLIFF
CHRIS RODGERS
DALE MARMION
NICK REDFERN
YASIN ALI
JAKE SHEPHERD
ROSS CANAVAN


SCOTLAND
JAMES BYRNE
SIMON DUNN

BRORA RANKED NO 9 IN BRITAIN'S VALUE FOR MONEY COURSES

                                The rural charm of Brora's 13th hole (image by Robin Wilson)

By ROBIN WILSON
Still despondent at not regaining their place in Golf World's Top 100 UK golf course rankings Brora Golf Club can look forward to a 2012 year of bounteous till receipts after gaining a top ten place by National Club Golfer magazine in their recent review of 100 best value for money golf courses charging a visitor's green fee of under £50.
Brora's James Braid-designed links golf course skirts Kintradwell Bay in the inner Moray Firth of Sutherland's East Coast and has changed very little from 1924 when the five times Open Champion visited and returned to the his plans for simplistic use of the natural links dissected by two wee Scottish burns flowing into the bay.
The course received a ninth place in the review which is published in their February issue available now in clubhouses. Brora is one of only three courses in Scotland to appear in the top ten, the two others rated on value are Boat of Garten in fourth position and Montrose number seven.
Yet even better news for the golfers who choose Brora is that last season's green fee of £45 which brought the club a record income of £120,000 has been retained for 2012. The Boat of Garten green fee is £37 and Montrose £40.
On completion of the rankings which placed the Welsh club of Royal St. Davids at No 1 with a green fee of £48, National Club Golfer's deputy editor, Mark Townsend raised Brora's profile even higher when he selected it as his favourite pick of the 100 featured courses.
He wrote “Picking just one course from the list was a genuine headache but if the criterion was to take away a group for a great day then you would struggle to beat Brora.
"The Highlands is special for plenty of reasons but if we are concentrating on golf courses this Highland beauty has plenty to boast about. It has a gentle start, generous fairways throughout and is as soothing as anywhere you rarely make it look even slightly silly. Whatever the case a visit here is looked back upon as the day of days.”
The Magazine's Editor, Dan Murphy as his favourite pick went for Tenby in Pembrokeshire which is ranked at number five.
Two season's ago Brora linked up with Golspie, Royal Dornoch and Tain to launch a Dornoch Firth Golf Pass which proved very successful. The four clubs were nominated for a 2011 Highland's Tourism award.
The Golspie and Tain courses have also features in the value for money rankings, Tain at Number 15 with a £44 green fee and Golspie number 56 for £40.
Royal Dornoch was omitted from this latest survey as it's championship course green fee has for some years exceeded the £50 upper limit but in a previous National Club Golfer survey carried out on courses with green fees under £80 the Dornoch championship links was rated first.
Other courses in the North who have been listed in the under £50 category include Fortrose and Rosemarkie (35) fee £38, Nairn Dunbar (39) fee £40 and Inverness (91) at £35 per round.
The magazine lists Shiskine as best value for money at number twenty nine and a green fee of just £20. It might just cost you that little bit more to get to Arran for the twelve holes on offer, but then if you have just come off the Wentworth course where you would have stumped out £360 last summer then the flight to Arran should not be too much of a worry.

2012 TREATS: Scottish Ladies at Tain, Scottish Men at Royal Dornoch

By ROBIN WILSON
Golfers of Ross-shire and Sutherland are in for treats in 2012 when their three outstanding links courses situated at Brora, Tain and Royal Dornoch all host championship events.
First to arrive in May are the Scottish Ladies Golfing Association  with their Women's (close) Championship event which will be played during the third week of May 2012, Tuesday 15th to Saturday 19th at Tain Golf Club.
It is the first time this championship has come to the Old Tom Morris-designed links but not a first visit from the SLGA. In 2005 the Scottish Girls championship was played at Tain but it arrived just one or two years too early for Tain's rising stars of that year, sisters Sammy and Julie Vass, but 2012 may give both of them the opportunity to emulate the club's heroine of 23 years ago, Lindsey Anderson, who reached the final of the Scottish women's championship at Lossiemouth in 1989.
In the same May week but starting a day later, May 16th to 18th, the men's Senior Northern Counties Championship returns to the James Braid links of Brora where the host club will be hoping to repeat their winning form of 2006.
The men's Scottish Golf Union return to Royal Dornoch for a third time and from July 31 to August 4 the cream of Scotland's amateur golfers will do battle over the world-renowned links.
Royal Dornoch previously hosted this championship in 1993, when the winner was Dean Robertson (Cochrane Castle), then in 2000 Steven O'Hara (Colville Park) triumphed.
The return of the Scottish men's championship to Dornoch has as it did twelve years ago causes some disruption to established local fixtures. To avoid a clash Tain Golf Club have held over their highlight four-day tournament until the week commencing Monday August 6th and the Carnegie Shield at Dornoch will not start until Sunday 19th August ending on Saturday August 25th.
Ignoring the clash with the Scottish Amateur, Brora Golf Club have stuck to their traditional end of July/August week to play their five-day premier event for the Clynelish Salver.
It will commence on Monday July 30th and end on Friday, August. Brora will end the championship visits on Friday September 7th 2012 with the North District Senior championship for the Macallan Trophy.

Billy Bell takes centre position after winning the Brora New Year competition. Left to right- back row -Gerd Gauche, Kerstin Gauche, Shaun Ashe, Alan McHoul. Front – Robin Wilson, Pat Ashe, Anne Clarke, Billy Bell, Jane McHoul, Katrina Tulloch



Brora's New Year's Day fireworks display to herald in 2012 was once again a spectacular success at the harbour. On Monday 22 members of Brora Golf Club began the fund-raising efforts for 2012 when they donated the entry fees from their January 2 golf competition.
Beating the stiff and cold wind with a very good effort of 33 Stableford points to get first pick of the donated prizes was the club's vice president, Billy Bell and he was followed to the table to pick a prize by second placed Robin Wilson who had 29 points.
Also with 29 points was Edinburgh-based Alan McHoul and then a trio with 28 points, Roddie Cameron, Andy Stewart and Shaun Ashe. The first lady player to visit the table was Jane McHoul with 27 points followed by Oxford's Anne Clarke (19pts), Katrina Tulloch (Edinburgh) (18pts) , and Pat Ashe (14pts).
Any winners who were not present at the prizegiving forfeited their prize which meant there were sufficient wines and chocolates left over to give to the Greenkeeper (James MacBeath) and his helper Alister Dunn who voluntary went out early in the morning to get the course ready for the competition.

EIGHT SCOTS IN FIELD FOR AFRICA OPEN

Eight Scots are in the draw for the first round of the Africa Open at East London Golf Club, Eastern Cape, South Africa.
They are (in order of starting times):
Raymond Russell
David Drysdale
Steven O'Hara
Alan McLean
George Murray
Lloyd Saltman
Alastair Forsyth
Craig Lee

Stand by for some low scoring when the first round gets underway tomorrow. The course has a par of 73 yet measures only 6,770yd. It has seven par-4s of under 400yd.