Saginaw Country Club Hosting 10th GAM Women’s Four-Ball Championship

 SAGINAW – The top women golfers in the state are once again being showcased on one of the state’s oldest classic golf courses at historic Saginaw Country Club.

  The 10th GAM Women’s Four-Ball Championship presented by Garland Lodge & Golf Resort will play out on the 121-year-old club’s course on Monday and Tuesday.

  The classic lines of the course date to the first nine holes being developed in 1898 by Charles H. Davis, a devotee of the game who purchased a farm and went to work. By 1902 the club had 100 members. The second nine, which was called the New Course formally opened in 1912 and was designed by members. The course was remodeled in the 1960s, and Michigan golf course architect Jerry Matthews remodeled parts of the course in 1983. The current clubhouse dates back to 1969.

  The club has a long relationship with Golf Association of Michigan events, having hosted the second Michigan Amateur Championship for men in 1907 and hosting seven more times through 1936. In recent years it has stepped up to host several GAM championships, including the 2018 GAM Super Senior Championship, the 2019 GAM Women’s Championship and the 2016 Women’s Amateur Championship.

  The course can be played at yardages between 6,143 and 4,905 with five tee positions, and Ken Hartmann, the senior director of rules and competition for the GAM, said it will favor the consistent golfer who keeps the golf ball out of the prevalent tree lines and demonstrates a strong short game around greens that are small by modern standards.

  Chris Alexander is the club manager, Chad Boyce the head golf professional and Rob Steger the superintendent. Learn more at saginawcountryclub.com.

  The GAM Women’s Four-Ball is open to golfers of all ages. In the Overall Division gross four-ball winners will be awarded trophies, and gross and net trophies will be awarded in full senior flights.

  Last year at Owosso Country Club Terry Delcamp of Grand Blanc and Joan Garety of Ada won for the fifth time in the last six years among the senior golfers, and a pair of University of Michigan golfers, Hannah Ghelfi of East Falmouth, Mass., and Sophia Trombetta of Independence, Ohio, won the open division.

  Delcamp and Garety are returning to defend among the seniors. Recent Michigan Junior Girls State Amateur champion Ariel Chang of Macomb Township and fellow junior standout Audrey Becker of Grosse Pointe Farms have teamed up, as have Michigan Golf Hall of Famer Stacy Slobodnik-Stoll of Haslett and newly-elected Hall of Fame member Julie Massa of Holt to play in the overall division.

   The gross winners’ names in the overall and senior divisions are inscribed on the tournament trophy, which his named The Garety/Hiestand Trophy in honor of Garety and fellow Michigan Golf Hall of Fame member Mary Jane Hiestand, who now lives in Florida.

RESULTS, PAIRINGS

-Greg Johnson, [email protected]

 

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