HARBOR SPRINGS –
Boyne Highlands Resort’s premier Heather and Moor golf courses will welcome a
standout field of 165 golfers Wednesday and Thursday for the 36th GAM
Mid-Amateur Championship presented by OmniKinetics.
Boyne Highlands is
hosting the championship for Michigan male amateur golfers over age 25 for the
17th consecutive year and 21st time in the history of the event. The Highlands,
also home to the Country Club of Boyne, features four courses that are part of
11 golf courses and 171 holes of golf that can be played at three Boyne Resorts
in the northern section of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula.
The field is split
in half this year to take on the Heather and Moor courses for the 36-holes and
two days of stroke play competition, and an overall Mid-Am winner and winners
in three other age categories will be determined (Mid-Amateur age 25-and-over,
Mid-Seniors 45-and-over, Seniors 55-and-over and Super Seniors 65-and-over).
Boyne Highlands, the
No. 1 choice in the “2015 Top Ten Favorite U.S. Golf Resorts for Value” by
GOLF.com, has long featured The Heather, a Robert Trent Jones course that has
been listed by Golf Digest among America’s 100 Greatest Golf Courses.
The Heather was
Boyne’s first golf course, and Jones created a classic that features wide
tree-lined fairways, sculpted bunkers and challenging water hazards. The Mid-Am
field is very familiar with The Heather. It hosted the 100th Michigan Amateur
in 2011, and will host the Amateur again in 2020.
The Moor was the
second course built at Boyne Highlands and challenges golfers with numerous
doglegs and water hazards. It, too, has a championship pedigree as host of past
Mid-Amateurs, the AJGA’s annual visit, the Kircher Cup and Harbor Cup
tournaments.
Nick Shaw and
Jeremy Neer are the superintendents at Boyne Highlands. Josh Richter is the
director of golf.
Defending champion
John Quigley of St. Clair Shores returns, as does three-time winner Anthony
Sorentino of Shelby Township, two-time champion Greg Davies of West Bloomfield
and past-champion Kevin VandenBerg of Oswego. Six-time champion Tom Werkmeister
of Grandville has turned professional at age 50 and is playing on the PGA Tour
Champions.
Last year Quigley, a
34-year-old strategist for Blue Cross Blue Shield shot a closing 3-under 69 on
the Moor course for 141 and a four-shot win. It was the first GAM title for
Quigley, who was a runner-up in the Mid-Amateur in 2015 to Sorentino.
-Greg Johnson
