The reigning North of Ireland and West of Ireland champion, Stuart Paul from Tandragee, and Tim Rice from Limerick will renew rivalry when they tee-off in the North of of Ireland Championship over the Dunluce and Valley courses at Royal Portrush next Monday. Shay Keenan reports.
Paul will be striving to add a third championship title in the 12 months, while Rice, the leading qualifier in the West, will be hoping to capture his first major.
Paul was the in-form player at Co Sligo when he strolled through to the final, where he played exceptional golf to ease past Derek McNamara by one hole.
Rice, who went to the quarter-finals in the West before going out to Chris Moriarty, who then lost to Paul in the semi-final, has had a lean time recently. He went out of the Close Championship at an early stage and will be anxious to impress the selectors before the Irish teams for the Home Internationals are selected.
Others who will be out to impress at Portrush are former South of Ireland champion Mark Campbell from Sackstown; his club-mate Michael McDermott; David Jones, who performed so well for Toledo University, and Stephen Crowe from Dunmurray.
The GUI Ulster Branch are looking for a new sponsor for the five-day event, but some of the €9,000 in entry fees will go to funding this year's event.
Alison Coffey, Emma Duggleby and Kerry Smith, three of the best players in Britain and Ireland, head the list of competitors who will be playing in the inaugural Women's British Open Mid-Amateur Championship at The Berkshire next weekend.
All three were recently named in the eight-strong Curtis Cup team to play the United States in Pittsburgh next month, and their entry to the mid-amateur extends to six decades the representation of former Curtis Cup players competing at The Berkshire.
Angela Bonallack, Ireland's Mary McKenna and Claire Dowling (nee Hourihane) represented GB&I in Curtis Cup matches from 1956 to 1992, while Duggleby first played in the Curtis Cup in 2000 at Ganton.
Others who might be expected to challenge for the title include former Scottish champion Anne Laing, her international team-mate Claire Hargan, scratch players Jayne Helen Demoily of Middlesbrough, Alison Waller and Sweden's Anne Larsson. Ireland will also be represented by Co Louth's Deirdre Smith, Emma Dickson (Royal Co Down), Sheena O'Brien Kenney (Grange), Trish Mangan (Ennis) and Sinead Keane from the Curragh.
The championship will be played over 54 holes with the winner receiving the Angela Uzielli Trophy, presented by John Uzielli in memory of his late wife.
Time is running out for Connemara's Derek McNamara in his bid to be fit for next week's European Youths championship in Gdansk, Poland.
McNamara is troubled with shin-splints, and first reserve Conor Doran, the recent winner of the Leinster Youths title at Stackstown, is standing by.
In a warm-up match at Seapoint Golf Club last Wednesday, Ireland scored a 6-3 win over Wales, but the Irish team were left trailing when the Youths Championship got under way on Thursday with Wales taking the top two places.
On the excellently set-up Seapoint course, Gareth Wright played the more consistent golf in the difficult conditions to beat team-mate Dai Price into second place. Ballyliffin's Philip McLaughlin was best of the home players in third place.
Wright, who won the Clywd Open in Wales earlier in the year, had rounds of 72, 71, 73 and 72 to beat Walker Cup squad member Price by five shots. They started the final round tied on 216, with McLaughlin two shots back after a course record 67, which included eight birdies, in the third round.
However, disaster struck for McLaughlin in the final round when he took nine at the first hole, and he did well to get his game back on track to cover the next 17 holes in level par and claim third place from Colm Montgomery (Malone) and half-way leader Greg Bowden from Hermitage.
