HIGHLAND – Six teams of a senior golfer over age 55 and Mid-Am golfer over age 25 will play off for the 9th GAM Senior Mid-Am Team Championship Friday at Prestwick Village Golf Club.
Three winning two-golfer teams and three runner-up teams were determined earlier this summer when 120 teams, or 240 golfers, squared off at three sites – Flint Golf Club, Lochmoor Club in Grosse Pointe Woods and Grosse Ile Golf & Country Club.
Those six teams will play 18 holes, including nine holes of best-ball, and nine holes of alternate shot, to determine a championship team.
Prestwick will challenge the golfers with a variety of holes, including some links style, traditional parkland and some carved from woodlands. Located just north of Milford in Highland Township on 426 acres of natural, rolling terrain amid a family-focused community, Prestwick was designed by architect Ron Garl. The course can play to as many as 7,142 yards but features six tee positions.
Four Michigan Open Championships were recently presented at Prestwick Village, which has also hosted various GAM tournaments and qualifiers for the last several years.
Brent Goulding is the director of golf, and Eric Davey the superintendent at the private club that also features one of the nation’s top-ranked golf ranges/practice centers.
Advancing to the finals from the Flint Golf Club site was the team of senior Rick Herpich of Orchard Lake and mid-am Michael Anderson of Northville. They won by a shot over the runner-up team senior Randy Lewis of Alma and mid-am Jason May of Oakland Township, which is also coming to the finals.
Advancing from Lochmoor was the winning team of senior Ken Chicka of Shelby Township and Andrew Smith of Troy, and the runner-up in a three-way playoff for the spot, Brian Vlazny of Livonia and Jerry Heiss of Canton. Heiss is traveling out of country and he is being replaced by Art Maciag of Ann Arbor.
Advancing from Grosse Ile was senior Roy Schultheiss of Bay City and Adam Hanson of Auburn, and runner-up team Robert Matthiesen of Holt and Mark Pawlowski of Mason. Pawlowski had a schedule conflict and is being replaced by Russ Cunningham of DeWitt.
-Greg Johnson, [email protected]
