Joy as new Safari Tour season is launched

Nyali Golf Club top amateur Adel Balala. [Mose Sammy, Standard]

Kenya Open Golf Limited (KOGL) yesterday officially launched the 2022/23 Safari Tour at the Muthaiga Golf Club.

The Safari Tour is a developmental event for African professional golfers which is held annually in Kenya and the East African region from June to February.

The Tour consists of eight to twelve professional golf tournaments with each event played over four rounds with a prize purse of a minimum of Sh2 million per event.

The 2022-2023 Safari Tour season will be played in various clubs in Kenya and Uganda, with the final event played at Muthaiga Golf Club in February 2023.

According to Patrick Obath, the tournament director of KOGL, the first leg of the Tour will be held in Uganda at Lake Victoria Serena Golf Resort and Spa on October 24-28.

"Our goal is to scale up and make the Safari Tour to be a significant part of the golfing calendar for the region and the continent at large. The Tour continues to attract Golf professionals from Africa and even beyond," said Obath.

Meanwhile, it's all systems go as Coast golfers sharpen their skills for this year's Kenya Amateur Strokes Play Golf Championship teeing off today at the par 72 PGA Vipingo Baobab Golf Course in Kilifi County.

The four-day event that ends on Sunday brings together leading 76 elite golf amateurs across the country's golf clubs, Uganda and Tanzania.

They will be battling for supremacy at the 18-hole championship course set high on the ridge with dramatic coastal views especially of the Indian Ocean.

The tournament is being held in memory of Kenya's first president, the late Jomo Kenyatta, where the trophy was first presented in 1978 by KGU first African chairman Chris Kahara-1978/79 and Col. M.J. Harbage, a KGU chairman 1977/78. [Maarufu Mohamed]