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Fairways have been trimmed, greens have been watered and golf balls are being set up on tees, as the 119th Canadian Men’s Amateur Championship gets underway in Saskatoon today.
The tournament will see 264 golfers compete over four days at Riverside Country Club.
Most of the golfers are from Canada, but there are some international entries as well.
Saskatoon golfer Justin Wood gets to compete on his home course at Riverside.
Wood said this is really special to him.
“I had this one circled on the calendar as soon as we knew it was coming here,” said Wood. “When I got that email, I fought back a couple tears.”
Wood didn’t have a normal path into this championship, as he only found out on Thursday he was able to compete.
“Generally I would’ve played the Saskatchewan Amateur earlier in July but I couldn’t play because of work,” he said.
“So I tried to qualify through the Riverside qualifier a few weeks ago and didn’t get through that.”
Wood said he was planning to play through the final qualifier that took place on Friday but received an email before that saying he had received an exemption into the tournament.
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Golfers teeing off on hole 1 of the Riverside Country Club. (Will Mandzuk/650CKOM)
Since Wood regularly plays at Riverside he knows where some of the challenging areas are and he said there are around six holes that could give people fits.
“On the front nine (holes) three, four, five,” said Wood. “Then 13, 14, 15 are two very difficult three hole stretches.”
Fellow Saskatoon golfer Jehremy Ryde said there might be two other holes that could give some players a rough time.
“I really think 17 and 18, you have to really place your ball on the proper spot on the green because there are some big ridges and that could give guys some trouble, it’s really easy to three putt on either of those greens,” he said.
Riverside is also Ryde’s home course and he is looking forward to the week.
“I love it, it’s a cool feeling, it’s more relaxing than normal,” said Ryde. “It’s a huge advantage to know where to hit it (the ball) and to know the breaks of the green.”
Ryde also noticed some differences on the course ahead of the tournament.
“The greens are quite a bit faster, the rough is thicker,” said Ryde.
“You can lose a ball just off the fairway so you have to watch where your ball finishes so you know where to look.”
Riverside’s associate professional Chad Lavallee also believes holes 13, 14, and 15 will give golfers some trouble.
“We call it Amen Corner here at Riverside because it’s our own version of it,” said Lavallee. The original Amen Corner is holes 11,12 and 13 at Augusta National Golf Club, home of the Masters.
Lavallee said weather is going to be a big factor in scores for the week.
“If the wind is blowing even par is going to be a great score,” said Lavallee. “If the wind’s not blowing then I’d expect to see some red numbers being posted up.”
Lavallee said it means a lot to bring the tournament back out to Riverside.
“This is the second largest men’s tournament in Canada,” said Lavallee. “It’s a really big deal for us to be hosting this and we’re tremendously honoured to host such a historic event.”
The last time Riverside hosted the tournament was in 2007, which Golf Canada tournament director Adam Cinel said had a pretty significant winner.
“We’ve been pretty fortunate to have some incredible players play in this championship at the start of their careers,” said Cinel. “Nick Taylor won it the last time this championship was held in Saskatoon.”
The tournament begins on Monday, and the first set of cuts happens on Tuesday after the second round.
The winner of the tournament gets to compete in the U.S. Amateur Golf Championship at Hazeltine National Golf Club in Minnesota from Aug. 12 and they also get to compete in next year’s RBC Canadian Open.
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