This is my final report of 2014 so I’ll take this opportunity to wish you all the very best for the festive season and a happy and healthy New Year. As always, thanks so much for your support these past 12 months. It really means a lot.
As we discussed in the previous report, last week was a proud moment for our entire team, with The Els Club Dubai hosting its first ever professional tour event, the inaugural Dubai Golf Open. Congratulations to Arjun Atwal who produced a superb final round to take the title. I must also send my congratulations to everyone at The Els Club Dubai, to the promoters golf in DUBAi, Troon Golf, and to my friends at the Asian Tour – you guys staged a fantastic event and the golf course looked amazing. The Els Club Dubai was so ready for this tournament and it was gratifying to hear so many positive comments from the players. Seriously, great job everyone.
This is the fourth golf course in our design portfolio to host a professional tour event, following The Els Club Copperleaf (Tshwane Open), Anahita Four Seasons Golf Resort (Mauritius Golf Masters) and Wentworth West Course (BMW PGA Championship). That number is soon to become five, with the announcement that Tiger’s Hero World Challenge, an annual tournament co-sponsored by the PGA TOUR, will be staged at our spectacular Albany in the Bahamas in 2015. We’re also going to be in talks to bring an Asian Tour event to The Els Club Teluk Datai, which you may know was voted the world’s best new golf course at the recent World Golf Awards.
All in all, these are exciting times at Ernie Els Design.
It’s also exciting for me to be taking on the role of host and ambassador for the South African Open Championship, starting at Glendower in January. Of course, I was very honoured to have been offered this role and accepted without hesitation as the South African Open Championship is a tournament with incredible history and has featured strongly throughout my career. We’re honoured also that Els for Autism and the Ernie Els & Fancourt Foundation will become the beneficiary charities of this tournament.
I now look forward to working together with the Sunshine Tour to achieve our shared vision of growing the SA Open, so that it can once again take its rightful place among the most prestigious tournaments in world golf. Whatever successes South African golfers have enjoyed around the world, none of us forgets the incredible start we had in our careers by having tournaments like the SA Open to play in on the Sunshine Tour. It is therefore imperative that we do our best to ensure that South Africa’s flagship events are sustainable for generations to come and I am delighted to be able to give my full support to achieving this. I have no doubt that my fellow countrymen who play on the European and PGA Tours feel the same way.
Anyway, between now and the New Year we’ll be giving away on Twitter some more VIP tickets for the SA Open courtesy of our friends on the Sunshine Tour. All you have to do is follow me @TheBig_Easy for your chance to win.
So, that’s about it for this year. Golf-wise the tournament tally for 2014 was 32, starting and finishing in the Arabian deserts of Qatar and Dubai. It was a winless season, a very rare occurrence for me in my professional career and one that obviously doesn’t sit well. Far from being disheartened, though, it just makes me even more determined in 2015. Competition is what it’s all about and that’s what still drives me; it’s in my blood. Any time you lift a trophy it’s a wonderful and memorable moment so I want to keep working hard, keep giving it 100 per cent, to try to experience that again and hopefully win one or two more majors before I’m done. Even just saying those words gets the juices flowing.
For now, though, it’s a time to relax and enjoy being with family and friends. I really hope you get to do the same this festive season.
Happy Holidays!
