Golf
Hainan golf tournament offers $1.28m prize
By Zhao Huanxin (chinadaily.com.cn)
Updated: 2010-03-18 13:53
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HAIKOU - A golf tournament, featuring professional players competing for a "winner takes all" prize of $1.28 million, will be held in late October in the capital of Hainan, China's southernmost province.
International movie stars and celebrity golfers Hugh Grant and Matthew McConaughey will play at the inaugural event for the Mission Hills Star Trophy, to be held from October 28-31 at the new Mission Hills Resort Hainan, organizers said in Haikou on Thursday.
The announcement followed the opening of the 2010 Haikou Golf and Tourism Forum Thursday morning in the tropical island, which is striving to build itself as a top international tourism resort by 2020.
The inaugural golf forum was attended by Hainan Governor Luo Baoming, and golfing industry heavyweights such as two-time Open Championship winner Greg Norman, and International Golf Federation co-secretary Peter Dawson.
The professional segment of the tournament will feature 20 male and female professional golfers competing for a "winner takes all" prize of US$1.28 million, the richest individual prize in Asian golf, according to a press release.
The professional field will also include two of the game's female superstars, Annika Sorenstam and Se Ri Pak, it said.
Chairman of the Hong Kong-based Mission Hills Group David Chu, who began to invest in China's golf industry 18 years ago, said he believed developing leisure sports would contribute to the country's effort to shift to a development mode based on a green and low-carbon economy.
