GOLF - Heavy hitters up the horsepower for strokeplay tournament

THE entry list for tomorrow's Northland Strokeplay tournament at the Whangarei Golf Club reads something like a who's who of Northland men's golf.
The 36-hole competition has attracted most of the area's top golfers, including the Lion Foundation Interprovincial team as well as the men's masters interprovincial team.
On top of the title of Northland Strokeplay champion, the tournament at the Mt Denby course will help decide the final places of the inaugural Northland Order of Merit competition.
The strokeplay tournament was supposed to be one of the first events in the order of merit competition but it was postponed by heavy rain in September - it has now become the deciding round of the 11-tournament competition.
While the net competition is still within reach of several players, the gross winner has already been decided.
The title was perhaps fittingly won by Kaitaia's Bob Shirley, one of the main supporters and organisers of the Order of Merit contest.
"It (the order of merit) was designed to increase participation in golfing events held around the province and I think it has done that," Shirley said.
There were points on offer for competitors at the 11 individual club tournaments throughout the season but Shirley said while the first year had been a success, the competition was still a work in progress.
"We're planning to make some changes to the (Order of Merit) competition next year. The idea is to introduce tiers into the event with the bigger, more prestigious events earning double the points towards the Order of Merit that a smaller event would," Shirley said.
The Northland senior selector and number-one masters player said the smaller 18-hole events would not earn as many points as a 72-hole event that drew the top players in next year's competition.
"We're also looking into running a matchplay order of merit competition next year, with the idea being that all of our representative games are matchplay and some of our better golfers don't play as much matchplay as they could - so this will be designed to encourage them to turn up and play more," he said.
The Northland Strokeplay tournaments starts tomorrow at 8am.