Heavy rain at Fancourt disrupted the opening day of the NTT Data Men’s Pro-Am and forced a schedule revision.
The men’s event has been reduced to 54 holes, while the Ladies’ Pro-Am will now be contested over 36 holes.
Heavy rain prevented a single ball from being hit on what was meant to be the first round of the men’s Sunshine Tour and HotelPlanner Tour co-sanctioned tournament on Thursday. Following repeated delays to the start of the round, it was eventually called off at 12:14pm.
The men’s tournament is traditionally played over the three golf courses of The Links, Outeniqua and Montagu.
But with all three golf courses left waterlogged by Thursday’s rain, the tournament has been shortened to 54 holes. It will now be played solely over the Outeniqua and Montagu courses for the first two rounds, after which there will be a cut and the final round will be played solely on the Montagu.
The ladies’ tournament was scheduled to start on Friday and has now been shortened to 36 holes on Saturday and Sunday with no halfway cut, and to be played solely on The Links.
“It’s a tough decision to make to have to cancel any round of golf,” said Gary Butler, tournament director of the HotelPlanner Tour. “We had 18mm of rain through the night, on top of the rain already had in this area. We had continual rain on Thursday.
“In consultation with the head greenkeeper it was felt the courses had gone too far for us to be able to play today. We have more rain forecast for Thursday evening and also Friday afternoon through the night into Saturday.
“So if we continued in the same course order of playing all three courses, if we had as much as a two-hour delay we wouldn’t be able to complete the tournament. So we agreed to change the format to accommodate this.”
Photo: Carl Fourie/Sunshine Tour
Article Link: Rain forces changes at NTT Data Pro-Am