Pin Fernando Trophy 2013 gets underway at Ridgeways
Friday, 12 July 2013 03:48
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The Pin Fernando Trophy inaugurated in 1979 during its Centenary year, to honour the best match-play golfer Sri Lanka has produced gets underway at the Ridgeways over the week-end.
Fernando passed away two years later but left his legacy of a grand total of 52 championships in his long and illustrious golfing career since his first Ceylon Championship victory in 1947. With 11 Sri Lanka Amateur Championship titles, two All-India Amateur Championship titles, two Sri Lanka Open titles, one Western Indian Open title, 19 RCGC Championship titles, 11 Havelock Golf Club Championship titles and seven Nuwara Eliya Golf Club Championship titles his record is still unmatched.
Pin’s company UTE, the sole dealers for Caterpillar machines and engines will be sponsoring this event like in the past. The tournament underwent a few changes in format before settling into a single stroke-play qualifying round followed by match play format of 16 qualifiers. UTE Chairman Priath Fernando, the former Captain of the RCGC, the current Vice President of the Sri Lanka Golf Union and the only son of the Late Pin Fernando is the driving force behind the energetic sponsorship of the Pin Fernando Trophy by UTE.
Last year’s Winner was the 13 handicapper Priyanga Hapugalle who played consistent and outstanding golf to beat Chamath Kulasinghe in a nail-biting final which went to a sudden-death 19th hole. This year promises to be even more competitive with the improvement of the golfers and the newcomers notwithstanding the growing youthful population on the golf course.
The ladies’ event inaugurated last year for the late Pam Fernando Trophy will be conducted concurrently at the RCGC. The first winner of the Pam Fernando Trophy was Suwen Selveratnam who beat Roshini Sangani in the final. Pam Fernando, was Pin’s wife who also had a distinguished golf record of five Sri Lanka titles and enjoys the honour of being the oldest winner of a National Golf Title mentioned in the Guinness book of World records.
