Last week the Staysure Tour chief executive officer traded in his suit and tie for a caddy bib and shorts at steamy Coffs Harbour Golf Club as his 23-year-old daughter Meghan captured the Women’s New South Wales Open for her maiden Ladies European Tour title.

sometimes I know how to use words… but not right now ?? pic.twitter.com/6vALAU1dWQ

— Meghan MacLaren (@meg_maclaren) March 4, 2018

This week the proudest Dad in golf is back in business mode at the 2nd Sharjah Senior Golf Masters and just as (and justifiably so) chuffed with the progress of the Staysure Tour as the circuit formerly known as the European Senior Tour prepares for it’s 2018 season bow.

A year ago the Englishman turned up to Sharjah Golf & Shooting Club having inherited one of the toughest sales jobs in golf as the new boss of the embattled over 50s circuit, replacing Andy Stubbs. Leading players, Italian Ryder Cup star Costantino Rocca the most vocal among them, were openly critical of the lack of (particularly early season) playing opportunities but MacLaren soothed fears by calmly seeking time to ease into the role and get his new house in order.

He’s over delivered on his early promises too – securing a first ever title sponsor for the European seniors in UK-based over 50s travel insurance provider Staysure as well as tagging no fewer than five new events onto last year’s schedule to bring it up to a tentative 20 events.

Tristan Jones / LET

While MacLaren was happy to loop away in the background in Australia last week, he’s the focus of all the early plaudits in Sharjah.

Said Ryder Cupper Barry Lane, a five-time European Tour winner and winner of six Staysure Tour titles: “David MacLaren has the Tour moving in the right direction and I think he’s doing a fantastic job.

“It was a great move by [European Tour supremo] Keith Pelley to put him in charge. David has fresh eyes and a fresh mind. He’s put his life and soul into the Staysure Tour and it’s been an amazing success.”

South African Chris Williams, the defending champion this week, was just as effusive. “David MacLaren is doing an excellent job as head of the newly named Staysure Tour. He’s a good communicator and he seems to have created an ideal relationship with the players, sponsors and spectators. He appreciates that there is a need to give something back to the sponsors who support the tournaments, particularly in regard to the Pro-Ams.

Related: Williams ready for Sharjah encore

“Having Staysure as the sponsor of the Senior Tour has certainly elevated things. It’s the first time the Senior Tour has had a sponsor and it has certainly given the Tour more credibility and a more solid financial standing.”

For his part, MacLaren insists the Staysure Tour is still very much a work in progress. But he’s pleased to have secured Staysure and delighted they will also be naming sponsors of one of the five new events – the revival of the flagship PGA Seniors Championship scheduled for Aug. 2-5 at The London G.C. in Kent. As well as the other new tournaments earmarked for Denmark, South Africa, Moscow and Spain, he’s also keenly anticipating the Senior Open’s return to the Old Course at St. Andrews in late July as a profile booster.

“While it is very easy to paint this as a huge rosy and encouraging picture and I think it is, I wouldn’t ever want to minimise the work that is required to make sure we maintain that momentum,” said MacLaren.

“Everyday brings a new challenge and you realise in this type of role that every single tournament, both new and existing, requires a lot of attention and a lot of respect and a lot of hard work. Just because we are able to create new events doesn’t mean we can’t spend just as much time making sure that our current events are happy events with happy sponsors.

“At the same time, the great thing for our current events is that they have seen growth and also obviously seen we’ve been able to bring in a title sponsor for the tour and that just gives everybody confidence. That confidence permeates through from sponsors to promoters, to staff, to players to spectators.

“But yes the progress, I guess, has been even more rapid than I could have hoped for and I think that is a testimony that everybody has brought into the strategy.”

But lets forget business for a moment and reflect on Meghan’s glory as she outlasted rookies Casey Danielson (USA) and Marita Engzelius (Norway) and Spaniard Silvia Bañon for her first victory in just her 11th LET start. It was no fluke of course – she won two titles on the LET Access Series as well as the developmental tour’s order of merit in 2017 and previously secured the winning Curtis Cup points as one of her final amateur acts in 2015. Still, it was clearly a very sweet moment for proud parents David and Mary, the latter a former Irish international who is currently playing the Spanish Senior Amateur.

“You just never know with golf and whether it is your daughter or it is somebody on the Staysure Tour, golf I think is the most incredibly unpredictable sport,” said MacLaren.

“If you take Meghan, she had gone out to Australia on the back of a very good first year as a professional, so she was looking forward to year two, goes out to Australia with a lot of confidence and promptly misses the first two cuts in the first two events. In the third event she’s 99 percent certain to miss again by a shot as well and things change and she ends up making the cut by a couple of shots, finishes 50th or something and it just seems like it is momentum, but very gentle momentum.

“She said, if only she’d known two or three weeks previous what was about to happen, then it would have been easier to deal with the time when it wasn’t quite going as well as she expected, but that’s golf.”

The final round, when Meghan lead by as many as four, was a rollercoaster for daughter and dad.

“The other thing that interested me about last week is I’ve never seen her play golf like that before, and as an un-objective father I can’t remember seeing anybody playing golf like that before and therefore you got into this mindset where it just looked like she was going to win by six, seven, eight shots. And then, what always happens in golf, just something, sometimes it’s dramatic but sometimes its imperceptible, and the whole thing tightens up.

“She was never six or seven shots ahead but that was what it looked like she was going to be and then all of the sudden that became three or four, and then all of the sudden it’s only two shots. And then of course, I dunno what her mindset was, I can only talk about mine, but you’re thinking about all sorts of things. So for her to then get over the line, the immediate emotion is not elation at all, it’s just relief [laughs] and then eventually it becomes huge pride in what she did. So yeah, it’s been quite a rollercoaster.”

It is, indeed, great to be riding the MacLaren train right now.

This is cool @DavidMGolf!

Some inspiring words for the #WomensNSWOpen champion ?@meg_maclaren from @garyplayer back in 2015 https://t.co/P07aVKzLFj

— Ladies European Tour (@LETgolf) March 6, 2018

The post David MacLaren is the father and facilitator of good golfing things appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

TROON, SCOTLAND – JULY 27: Laura Davies of England plays her tee shot to the 12th hole during the first day of the Aberdeen Asset Management Ladies Scottish Open at Dundonald Links Golf Course on July 27, 2017 in Troon, Scotland. (Photo by Mark Runnacles/Getty Images)

By Joel Beall
Laura Davies has over 80 professional victories in her distinguished career, including four major championships. Though she hasn’t found the winner’s circle in quite some time, the 53-year-old is about to add another accomplishment to her mantle.

Davis is set to become the first woman to compete in a men’s senior tour event, accepting an invitation to next year’s Shipco Masters.

“My golfing career has been played in parallel with a number of players who are currently on the Senior Tour,” said Davies in a statement. “I’m really looking forward to testing my wits against them.”

The competition, part of the European Senior Tour, is set for June in Denmark at Denmark’s Simon’s Golf Club.

“Dame Laura’s participation in this event is an honor for the European Senior Tour,” said David MacLaren, head of the circuit. “She has been one of my golfing heroes since 1996 and this is another example of the European Tour and European Senior Tour being prepared to innovate and look to attract a wider audience to the game of golf.”

The post Laura Davies to become first woman to compete in senior tour event appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

What David MacLaren, the new Head of the European Senior Tour, can guarantee is his loyalty to the circuit’s newest stop and his commitment to grow the tour, whether that is in the UAE, the wider Arabian Gulf or beyond.

Several high-profile players, Italian Ryder Cup star Costantino Rocca the most vocal among them, called for increased playing opportunities on the over 50s circuit during the $425,000 season-opener at Sharjah Golf & Shooting Club.

SEE ALSO
Rocca: European Senior Tour must ‘cultivate’ sponsors and not get greedy

A Middle East swing, something to mirror the European Tour’s ‘Desert Swing’ in Abu Dhabi, Doha and Dubai, was mooted given that the Senior Tour, following Chris Williams’ playoff win Saturday, essentially now goes into hibernation until late June and another new event, the European Tour Properties Senior Classic in Finland.

Outside of the co-sanctioned U.S. PGA Championship in Washington (May 25-28) and the U.S. Senior Open in Massachusetts (June 29-July 2), majors that few of the European members are guaranteed to start, there are in fact only two events in the first four months of the season.

MacLaren has revealed he is in talks to add new stops in Sri Lanka and Madagascar from 2018 which would pad out the scantily clad early-season schedule.

“I think they [Sri Lanka and Madagascar] would both be obtainable, or reachable, from here [Sharjah] and that would give us a nice three tournament swing,” MacLaren said.

South African Chris Williams celebrates at Sharjah Golf & Shooting Club

Whether further Middle East events can be added remains to be seen however. MacLaren understands the enthusiasm for a Senior Desert Swing but is mindful of the four European Tour events and the two European Ladies Tour tournaments already hosted in the Middle East. He also wants to ensure Shurooq (the Sharjah Investment & Development Authority) are fully repaid for their three-year bankrolling of the Sharjah Masters.

“I think there is. I’m in the capable hands of Nick Tarratt who runs our regional office out of Dubai, and I think there is,” MacLaren said if there was room for further Middle East events.

“But I’m also very conscious that we must get the balance right between not enough tournaments and too many tournaments. In some ways, I think I’d obviously prefer one very strong tournament than three or four tournaments that aren’t as strong….I’d much prefer to ensure we’re giving the best to Sharjah and the best to Shurooq and the best to Sharjah Golf & Shooting Club.

“If other opportunities arise out of that, that’s absolutely great. But I feel a loyalty to this because of all the investment everybody has made. Even as a self contained tournament this is a symbol of what the Senior Tour is all about and is one of three, possibly four new tournaments this year and that’s good for everybody.”

MacLaren praised SGSC Managing Director and Vice Chairman, H.E. Sheikh Mohammed Bin Abdullah Al Thani, and the club’s tireless Director of Golf, Martin Duff, for pulling the Sharjah Masters together inside a year. It was the first time the European Tour has played an event on a nine-holer which was beamed around the globe in immaculate condition thanks to widely hailed Kiwi course superintendent Marty Brown.

SEE ALSO
Williams beats his inner demons to win inaugural Sharjah Seniors title

He also commended Shurooq CEO H.E. Marwan Bin Jassim Al Sarkal for his foresight in ensuring the tournament’s television coverage went beyond the European Senior Tour’s usual product with three one-hour highlights programmes available for same day distribution in 65 countries.

Media coverage is vital to grow the tour and part of the chicken and egg argument voiced by Rocca. The 60-year-old urged MacLaren not to be greedy when it comes to sponsorship negotiations or contract renewal talks.

“I was reading with interest Tino’s [Constantino Rocca’s] comments and he’s absolutely right. And the funny thing is that his comments, that’s exactly what our strategy is, which is yes, we’d love to have 20 tournaments at a million dollars each but I’d prefer create for the guys 20 tournaments [full stop],” MacLaren said.

“If that means we’ve got to play for less prize-money to start with and build from the bottom up, then I think that’s the right strategy. Because then you are creating momentum, you’re creating a base.”

MacLaren clearly has support for what is a tough sell; previous Senior Tour events in Bahrain and Abu Dhabi didn’t survive beyond two seasons. He was hand-picked by new European Tour chief Keith Pelley nine months ago to revive the Senior Tour and head up European Tour Properties, the latter including Dubai’s Jumeirah Golf Estates.

South African Williams, who beat Englishman Gary Marks in overtime to become Sharjah’s inaugural champion, is also impressed with MacLaren’s early work.

“We’ve got a new guy, David MacLaren, he’s a really sharp chappie, a really clever guy,” said Williams. “He speaks several languages and he’s obviously negotiating in a native language which is a big thing, speaking to the French in French [for example]…”

Like Williams, MacLaren knows the stars of yesteryear are the European Senior Tour’s greatest commodity with a Pro-Am start alongside the likes of a Rocca, two-time senior major champion Roger Chapman or reigning Senior Open Champion Paul Broadhurst a unique opportunity.

David MacLaren, the European Senior Tour’s new chief, chats with Welshman Mark Mouland during the Sharjah Senior Golf Masters presented by Shurooq

“The great thing is I think we’ve got a product that works and it’s a product that works because of how well our players can engage,” said MacLaren. “ They can interact with amateur partners and sponsors and corporate guests more than any other tour can do. The guys are more relaxed, they’re more experienced, they’ve got more time and they’re much more willing to share.

“So media is important, social media is important but actually it’s the on the ground experience that our players can give that actually is really what our USP [unique selling point] is and that’s what makes a Senior Tour tournament special.

“The ability to play a round of golf in a Pro-Am with sponsors, members, with [tournament] staff even, that’s the magic, that’s the magic of the Senior Tour and that’s what I want to use as the centrepiece for how we build going forward.”

MacLaren says seniors golf was impacted even more keenly by the “global economic meltdown” than any other level of the game because “tournament sponsorship and sports sponsorship is something that can be sacrificed by larger companies.”

But with Sharjah, Finland, the English Senior Classic at Forest of Arden Hotel and Country Club in Coventry (October 20-22) and possibly the Dutch Senior Masters (earmarked for October 6-8) added to this year’s schedule, he’s confident about the future.

“We’re in a very good place because we’ve got some upward momentum. For the last few years our Senior Tour players haven’t been used to tournaments at the beginning of the year and I am really hopeful this will prove a catalyst for some more new tournaments in this part of the world.

“But even if that doesn’t happen, to know we can come back here for the next three years to such a special place, and I mean that genuinely, is something that gives us great heart and fills us with great pride.

“To start as spectacularly, genuinely, as we have this week [in Sharjah], that’s something I won’t forget, that’s something our players won’t forget.”

The post THE BIG READ: European Senior Tour chief David MacLaren on Sharjah’s impressive debut and tackling golf’s toughest sales job appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.