Trump’s Turnberry Open dream dashed by R&A
There’s not been much bad news for Donald Trump recently on the US Presidential campaign trail, after sweeping up in South Carolina last weekend and moving on to so-called ‘Super Tuesday’ next week as the firm frontrunner for the republican nomination.
But here’s some news that might cause a furrow or two, or even one of those notorious rants that have placed him at odds with vast swathes of the golf community.
Turnberry, the Ayrshire jewel he bought in 2014 precisely because it was an Open venue, will not be hosting the game’s showpiece event any time soon.
Asked about future Opens at the time of his purchase, Trump declared: ‘We now have the greatest canvas in all of golf, so ultimately they can’t avoid it.’
Well, the royal and Ancient Golf Club are doing a pretty good job of avoiding it so far.
Turnberry was overlooked when the venues were named for 2017-19 and Martin Slumbers, the newish chief executive, made clear yesterday it won’t get the honour in 2020 or 2021 either.
Now why would this be, given it hasn’t hosted The Open since 2009 and Trump is presently spending so much money on renovating the course and the prized hotel that his son eric wittily remarked: ‘We had an unlimited budget and we’ve comfortably exceeded it.’
Surely the r&A should be desperate to return to the most wondrous-looking venue on the Open rota, and particularly given their designated golf architect, Martin ebert, is overseeing the changes?
It was difficult not to feel for Slumbers as he faced a roundtable of the nation’s golf writers for the first time, and a battery of such questions.
The elephant in the room, of course, was that Trump’s repellent views on Muslims, Mexicans and indeed most sections of the general populace that golf has a hard enough job appealing to as it is, renders him and anything he owns completely out of bounds.
But how could Slumbers, even if he wanted to, say that publicly of a man who might become the next US President?
And so he skirted around the edges, making it clear Turnberry remained on the rota of 10 courses but citing all sorts of unconvincing reasons as to why its lavish refurbishment will go unseen for the foreseeable future. his discomfort was obvious.
‘It would be ludicrous if something said on the Presidential campaign trail dictated where an Open is held,’ said Peter Dawson, Slumbers’s predecessor, shortly before his retirement last August. how the world has moved on.
The next bulletin on the 2022 Open and beyond is not expected until the next US President will be about a third of the way through his four-year term.
And what will the r&A do then, if Trump has indeed become the most powerful man in the world? Dare they snub the President?