Big field for US Travel Advisors Golf Tournament

POINTING to a full field of 150 participants down to tee off in this morning’s 18th annual United States Travel Advisors Golf Tournament at Sandals Golf and Country Club in Upton, St Mary, Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett on Saturday said the turnout was indicative of golf as a drawcard and the lure of Jamaica for North American travellers.

Returning off a two-year break due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the four-man scramble was launched at Beaches Boscobel with a full house of travel advisers raring to hit the greens after being addressed by keynote speaker Bartlett and Gary Sadler, executive vice-president of sales and industry relations at Unique Vacations.

One of three tournaments hosted annually by Sandals to promote Jamaica as a golfing destination, the United States Travel Advisors two-day match will be followed next month by the pioneering Baxter Canadian tournament and the Latin American version, which was started in 2013.

Bartlett said that Jamaica reopening its borders on June 20, 2020, three months after the pandemic hit, was key to the island’s tourism industry being able to rebound as a “resilient destination with a .01 per cent incident of COVID-19 infection”.

“This is the best summer Jamaica has ever experienced, not only 5,000 more visitors than 2019, but earnings were 20 per cent higher than that record year,” the tourism minister revealed.

“The projection is 2.6 million stop-over visitors; note, cruise is not included, with earnings of US$4.2 million projected,” he added.

Advised to “follow your caddies” by General Manager Charles Blatter, the travel advisers will compete in various mini-competitions throughout the tournament, which will crown its overall champions and runners-up tomorrow.

Male and female categories such as ‘Closest to the Pin’ and ‘Longest Drive’ should again be popular among the travel advisers and caddies, some of whom have represented Jamaica as national players, rising through the ranks of Sandals’ youth golf programme.