Sarawak Championships to make Asian Tour debut this year

PETALING JAYA: The Asian Tour is set to make its first stop in

Sarawak since its inception in

2004.

The inaugural Sarawak Championship, to be held at the Damai Golf and Country Club from July 4-7, has been added into the region’s premier Tour’s growing tournament schedule for this season.

The US$300,000 (RM1.2mil) tournament is the 15th stop of the season following the Korean Open.

The Sarawak Championship will also be the fourth Asian Tour event in Malaysia this year after the EurAsia Cup in January, the Maybank Championship (February) and CIMB Classic (October).

Although the Sarawak Championship will be debuting on the Asian Tour, the Land of Hornbills has been a regular destination for the Tour’s feeder circuit – Asian Development Tour (ADT) – since 2012.

This season, the state is hosting two ADT events in September – PGM Miri Championship (5-8) and PGM MNRB (12-15).

No further details have been released at the moment on the Sarawak Championship as the organisers are expected to make an official announcement in two weeks’ time.

But the field is expected to feature no less than 144 players with a significant number of playing berths allotted for locals, including those without Asian Tour full membership status.

Only four Malaysians – Gavin Kyle Green (pic), Nicholas Fung, Danny Chia and Ben Leong – are Tour card holders.

The now- defunct Selangor Masters was the last full-field event hosted in Malaysia in 2014.

The tournament was discontinued after its seventh edition.

The Volvo Masters of Malaysia (1997-2001) and Iskandar Johor Open (2007-2012) were the other two tournaments with similar status.

The Maybank Championship is a limited-field event as it’s co-sanctioned with the European Tour, so is the CIMB Classic which is one of the US PGA Tour stops.