Golf is once again an Olympic sport

The Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake, Mersyside, England will, this year, once again play host to the third Major of the year, The Open Championship.

This, the oldest and perhaps the most prestigious of the four majors in golf, is the only one played outside the United States of America.

The other three, The Masters, The US Open and the PGA Championship, are all played on sites in the US.

Even though 143rd edition of The Open, as the British like to refer to it, started yesterday, we shall, to-day, spend time on an even more exciting development; the re-entry of golf into the Olympics.

The International Golf Federation President, (IGFP), who also doubles up as the CEO at Royal & Ancient, Peter Dawson, announced, on Monday, 14th July, 2014, the qualification system for the 2016 Olympic Games.

Some golf enthusiasts may remember Peter Dawson's visit to our country, Kenya, some ten years ago, as the then Chairman of the R&A Rules Committee when he conducted a very successful Golf Rules School: which planted the seed for the first local golf referees.

The 2016 Olympics Games will be held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and after a long break, golf, will be one of the competition events; there will be an Olympic golf champion after the 2016 Olympics!

There is a very detailed list, on their website, of the qualification criteria, which follows the ratification of the system by the Executive Board of the International Olympics Committee (IOC).

The two-year qualification period will run from 14th July 2014 to 11th July 2016.

It will be open to speculation whether Brazil will be looking forward to hosting The Olympics after the World cup debacle of 2014!

But the IGFP and the International Olympics Committee seem to have been especially sensitive to the national interests as a provision has been included for the host country to be guaranteed at least one Brazilian female and male golfer to compete in the Games, if otherwise not eligible under the other qualification criteria.

In both the women's and men's events a field of sixty players will compete in a 72-hole stroke play format competition for the Gold, Silver and Bronze medals. The sixty positions available in each event will be allocated through an Olympic Golf Ranking (OGR) website, based on the player's respective Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR) as follows:

a)Players within the top fifteen on the respective women's and men's OWGR as of 11th July 2016, will be eligible, except that there will be no more than four players from any one country eligible within the top 15.

This is an important restriction as most of the top twenty players on the OWGR have for, a while now, been, either from the USA or Europe.

b) The balance of the field will be selected in order from the 16th place onwards on the respective women's and men's official world golf rankings as of 11th July 2016, up to a maximum of two players per country for those countries not already having more than two players within the top-15.

There is a further provision that each of the five continents of the Olympic Movement, Africa, Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceania, will be guaranteed at least one athlete in each of the women's and men's events, if not otherwise eligible, based on position within the respective official world golf rankings.

Both this provision and the provision on the host country representation will not increase the fields for both the women's and the men's competitions beyond the stipulated sixty athletes.

Throughout the two year qualification period, the Olympic Golf Ranking list will be published each week using the current rankings on the official world golf ranking. The International Golf Federation will publish the final list of the OGR on 11th July 2016, following the conclusion all eligible events.

The 143rd edition of The Open is the first qualifying event for the OGR.