Post Tournament Report: The Helsinborg Open Vasatorp Golf Club, Helsinborg. Tournament Director: Yvonne Cassidy

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1 Post Tournament Report: The Helsinborg Open Vasatorp Golf Club, Helsinborg Tournament Director: Yvonne Cassidy

2 Tournament Office This is a brief documented synopsis following the very successful staging of the Inaugural Helsingborg Open held at Vasatorp Golf Club, Helsingborg, Sweden. Although some of these observations may appear negative it is important that they are acknowledged and documented in order that they can be addressed for future years. I would like to give my sincere thanks to all persons involved in the staging of the tournament. To all the wonderful members of Vasatorp Golf Club for giving us their club so willingly and for their great support prior to and during the tournament. I would like to thank in particular and to show appreciation to the Project Manager for the event Beth Engblom for the professional, courteous and friendly manner in which she carried out her work in delivering the event. I would also like to recognise the friendly and enthusiastic manner in which her team members took to their individual tasks and gave all players, tournament staff, guests and spectators a most warm and genuine Swedish welcome. This is an observation which was genuinely acknowledged by the Players.

3 Tournament Office Tournament office The LET tournament office was of good size and it worked well. It was in a good location and had easy access for players. It was appreciated that the internet and a printer was set up for our arrival on the Friday prior to tournament week. The LET staff had adequate working stations and a private office was available for the CEO and for private meetings. The buggies were located at the staff car park to the back of the main clubhouse building. Each person who was allocated a buggy was responsible for charging at the end of play. The buggy s were well looked after and cleaned each evening and this system worked well. Score recording was in purpose built area outside the LET tournament office. It was of good size and the area worked well and was roped off for public and media.

4 Player services Airport transfers Players lounge As with any new event there will be some areas that may require more attention in future years. I think that the airport transfers are such an area. It is not an easy venue to service airport transfers considering the distance involved from Copenhagen Airport to Helsingborg. Perhaps consideration should be taken into giving players a return train ticket as was done in the past with events staged in a neighbouring city. This may in fact turn out to be a cheaper option for the promoters. The transfers from the hotel to the golf course worked really well and ran without incident. LET staff was given a two courtesy cars for the week and this was appreciated. The player s lounge although not very big was adequate and comfortable. The food served was excellent and the players were thankful for the availability of free food offered to them. The system of player s guests purchasing vouchers if they wanted to dine in the player s lounge seemed too worked well without any difficulties.

5 Player services On-course services Players services update (bag run, physio, club workshop, yardage books) Accommodation Fruit, pens, water and tees were available on the 1 st & 10th tee each day. I am happy to report that plenty of water was available on course. Dr. Andrew Levick and Ditta worked in an area of the locker rooms located in the main clubhouse building. They had a spacious area to work from and it seemed to work well for the players. The Yardage books were again prepared by Jeff Collington and I am happy to report they were delivered on time without incident. The official Hotel was centrally located to the Helsingborg centre and situated next to Helsingborg train station which was convenient. The hotel also very kindly made a players room available in which computers were made available for players use. This area was also used for posting player and tournament information.

6 Functions/Pro-Ams Functions Pro-ams An official welcome reception took place on the Tuesday evening in the main foyer of the official hotel, the Marine Plaza. This event was attended by all participating professionals, sponsors and press. Helen Alfredsson did a great job interviewing on stage Anna Nordqvist, Caroline Hedwall, Christina Kim and I.K Kim. It was a relaxed evening and the entertainment was an Abba tribute band which was extremely fitting and enjoyed by all. The tournament pro-am s were a great success and the feedback from the amateur players, sponsors, professionals and promoters was extremely positive. Two separate shot guns took place. The morning session starting at 07:30 and the afternoon session at 13:00. The pace of play was good and after each session a presentation took place involving the top 3 professionals. Unfortunately there was an error made in recording which resulted in a team missing out on a prize. LET apologised to the team in question and agreed to provide a similar prize to the team members.

7 Communications & Scoring Scoring The scoring system was operated by Ray Smith Scoring and I would like to congratulate them on an excellent and professional job. LET live scoring operated well. Radios Ropes and staking Radio s operated well with little or no difficulties. This is an area which needs to be improved in certain sections of the course. Lessons have been learned and practices can be improved for future years. The obvious areas of concern was tee 8 and green 8 & 17.

8 Course Review Golf course Vasatorp Golf Club is an excellent host venue and the TC Steve Forrest and Arthur Hills designed course is one of the strongest and most challenging designed courses that LET have played on in the 2013 season so far. Although built on parkland it has an amazing links feel and links character attached to it. The design feature of rolling fairways and positioning of water hazards and bunkers all contribute and I believe encourages this sentiment. It offers a tough but fair challenge to players and added by some severely designed undulating greens only adds to the wonderful test the players must face. Unfortunately and perhaps due to the closure of the Classic Course for renovation the TC was presented in a state that was perhaps not up to scratch and I believe this was a direct result of over play due to the closure of the Classic. However I would like to give full credit to Bengt Börjesson and his team for the arduous work they put in presenting us with a superbly presented course in difficult circumstances. Tees, Collars and Approaches all presented well although some fairways had more scarring due to overplay than others.

9 Course Review Golf course Bunker consistency was good as was sand dept and the edging was well defined. Aesthetically they also looked and presented well. The bunker programme was effective and the pulling of sand away from the bunker edges to help define the perimeters was effective. The greens although didn t look great putted well. The green speed achieved was perfect for the windy conditions which were experienced and again I would like to thank Bengt Börjesson for his understanding and assistance in accommodating LET s agronomy requests especially with regard to green speed. During Julian Mooney s initial agronomy visit the problem of Moss on some greens was highlighted. Unfortunately the time scale involved was too tight for any real progress to eradicating this problem could be made. Recommendations have been put forward and hopefully these will help with solving the problem for future seasons. It was great to hear such high praise for the course and the purpose built practice areas and putting greens by the players and all credit and thanks must go to Bengt Börjesson and his team.

10 Review I would like to on behalf of all the Players and LET tournament staff take this opportunity to thank all those persons involved in the staging of this the Inaugural Helsingborg Open. I know that the players really enjoyed being back in Sweden and to be playing on should a challenging and excellent course made their return even more enjoyable. The atmosphere from day 1 was fantastic as were the crowds and the behaviour of the spectators. It was wonderful to see such an enthusiastic crowd and great numbers out supporting not only the Swedish Players but the top players on Ladies European Tour. I would again like to thank Beth Engblom for all her efforts in ensuring the staging of a first class event. I would like to thank on behalf of the Ladies European Tour the Swedish Golf Federation for their continued support in helping to grow the popularity of Women s Golf in not only Sweden but by bringing LET back to Sweden in Europe. I look forward to working closely with the Federation in growing the Helsingborg Open into one of the premier events on the LET calendar.

11 Media Report General comments: 1. The inaugural tournament was highly successful and gathered a high quality field of competitors, including Caroline Hedwall, Anna Nordqvist and IK Kim (all in the world s top 25). 2. The timing was perfect, just after Europe s Solheim Cup win. 3. Fantastic golf course: several players later commented that this was the best course they played on tour all season and more messaging can be created along these lines if the tournament returns to the same venue in future years. 4. The location, close to Caroline Hedwall s family home, facilitated a special feature for CNN Living Golf to be filmed, which will be repeated over the coming months on all platforms. 5. The event attracted a good selection of quality journalists and photographers from national media organizations. 6. The media centre itself was pretty small and squashed but conveniently located. 7. Formal press conferences with the top players took place in an informal setting, which worked okay but was part of the main clubhouse entrance and could have been a little quieter. 8. It was fantastic that we had live tournament TV within the media centre over the weekend. 9. It was of course fantastic that the action was broadcast live on STV. 10. The internet speeds and live scoring worked very well. 11. All interviews took place on the 18 th green after the prize giving. When the winner comes from behind, it seems there is always a delay for the live television interview whilst the winner waits for the final group to sign their score card. It would be helpful if this could be addressed to avoid any unnecessary delays between the end of play and the prize giving on the 18 th green in order to keep the maximum number of spectators there.

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