The Hay River chapter of the Mediocre Golf Association was scheduled to get going this past weekend with its inaugural tournament at the Hay River Golf Club.
That was before the evacuation order was given, but the new start date is right around the corner.
The first event of the 2023 season is the Rebel Beach Am-Am, the MGA’s version of the Pebble Beach Pro-Am tournament, and it will now take on Friday with a tee-off time of 5:44 p.m. The original date was May 25, but the fire situation forced the postponement.
Vince McKay, the chapter’s president, said the decision was made to push back the tournament by one week because not everyone would have returned home in time for everything to begin.
There are a total of eight tournaments every year and all of them are a play on words of actual golf tournaments on the PGA Tour. For example, there is The Bastards, which is the MGA version of The Masters. The U.S. Open is known by the MGA as the F.U. Open and the British Open goes by the Bratish Open.
While it may look as if the MGA doesn’t take itself seriously, tournaments are held under Golf Canada rules and players are subject to rules around handicaps. Any player with a handicap of 18 or lower is subject to penalty strokes on their gross score, the amount of strokes it takes a player to play a round.
McKay said no other tournaments have been affected by the postponement of the first one.
“The first tournament may not be as successful, but I’m hoping the rest will be,” he said.
As crews continue to fight the fire, McKay said the course has managed to stay clear of any threat.
“Currently, there’s no threat of fire, however there is always the potential with our course being surrounded by thick trees,” he said. “Someday, the golf course executive and the town will have to look at fire-smarting the golf course.”
The Yellowknife chapter held its Rebel Beach Am-Am tournament at the Yellowknife Golf Club this past weekend and there’s hope that both chapters will be able to meet and have a head-to-head tournament.
Shaun Morris, president of the Yellowknife chapter, said he’s spoken with McKay already and plans are already in the works.
“We’re hoping to have a battle of the lake, something like a Ryder Cup-style of tournament,” he said. “We’ll see how they get their chapter going, but I’ve told Vince they have to come here and play because we’re the OGs (original golfers).”
The Ryder Cup is a biennial tournament featuring the best men’s professional players from the U.S. and Europe playing a series of matches with different formats such as best ball, alternate shot and head-to-head using the match play format. That differs from stroke play where golfers try to win each hole by having the better score.
As for regular operations at the club, the course reopened to the public on May 26. The men’s league was scheduled to have its first night of the new season on Tuesday, a week later than expected because of the evacuation order.