Tournament Preview: PNG Open
August 15th - 18th, 2024 | Royal Port Moresby Golf Club
Well, this is what we came for.
Seven months of planning, selling everything we own, hauling our children across the US in our Land Rover, navigating a thirty-six hour travel day to Australia, acclimating to a new culture, and doing everything in our power to make our new home comfortable in just over a week …
… all of it for the opportunity to pursue my greatest passion. This week at the PNG Open in Papa New Guinea marks the official start of the PGA Tour of Australasia season and my biggest opportunity to date to jumpstart my professional golf career.
When we made plans to move to Australia, I was NOT expecting to be competing quite so soon. I had events lined up for middle of September and early October to start, but getting an invite into the PNG Open was not even remotely on my radar. I thought I’d have about six weeks with Kaylie and the kids to get everything squared away before I needed to travel.
A few days prior to us leaving for Australia, I got a surprise email from the Tour asking if I’d be interested in competing via one of their “international invites” (essentially a sponsor’s invite for non-Aussie, non-PNG folks). They had seen my Substack, liked my story, and asked if I’d play. A quick consultation with my amazing wife (I say it over and over but very hard to explain to anyone outside of our relationship how supportive that woman is) and some googling around feasibility for getting a visa in time ensued … ultimately resulting in me accepting the invite and diving into the planning process (visa, flights, hotel, etc.).
Fast forward a little less than two weeks and I’m about 36 hours from teeing off in the first round with the hopes of playing well, earning some early season Order of Merit points, and setting myself up for success as the season really gets rolling in late September/October.
I’d like to say I’m not nervous and that I’m treating this like any other event. And I think there was probably some truth to that up until this weekend (I was too busy to be nervous).
But over the past couple of days, as I’ve played practice rounds and immersed myself in tournament week, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have butterflies. I know my years in this sport are (relatively) numbered and playing opportunities don’t just grow on trees. So instead of letting that get to me, I’m choosing to embrace the urgency a bit and recognize there are no shots to give away, no mental mistakes to be made, and no stones to be left unturned in preparation. I know I’m good enough to compete at my best … now I just need to ensure my best shows up on Thursday..
The Event
Tournament: 2024 PNG Open (PGA Tour of Australasia)
Golf Course: Royal Port Moresby Golf Club
Location: Port Moresby, Papa New Guinea
Live Scoring: Link Here
The PNG Open has been played off and on since the ‘70s, with the last seven iterations (including this year) being sanctioned by the PGA Tour of Australasia. This year, it holds the honor of being the opening event for the Tour as the rest of Australia starts to extract itself from the depths of winter (I say this tongue in cheek … it ain’t cold in Melbourne but if you heard the way many Aussies talked about the weather, you’d think they were sharing the continent with eskimos).
The event is four rounds (Thursday through Sunday) with a 36 hole cut that will see the top 50 professionals and ties play the weekend. Total purse size for the event is $200k Aussie dollars. This is an official event so Order of Merit points will be handed out as well.
Based on my conversations with the (awesome) team running the event, it sounds like the PNG Open gets a lot of support from the local community. Early in the week, I caught a glimpse of multiple tents going up around the course where local businesses will be hosting clients and taking in the action. It looks like there will be a great vibe, especially around the eighteenth hole on the weekend. The Wednesday pro-am is a big event on the island .. so much so that the Prime Minister is apparently taking part in it.
Local corporate support aside, I’d be remiss if I failed to mention the poverty that surrounds the golf club. The course is completely surrounded by a fence, and security guards roam the perimeters to ensure the safety of the players. There is a settlement just beyond the eastern boundary of the golf course where it is fairly easy to see and hear signs of hardship.
I did have a chance to “show off” for some kids watching through the fence who politely clapped and hollered after I hit a drive. A golf tournament can’t fix poverty, but hopefully the kids outside the fence looking in at the event this week can take some kind of inspiration from the happenings on the other side. Perhaps one day they’ll flip the script and show off for their countrymen.
The Course
Royal Port Moresby Golf Club is a bit different from what we would typically see in the US or in Australia.
Sandbelt golf, this is not. In fact, the course doesn’t have a single bunker on it … anywhere. The greens are surrounded by these almost moat-like swales on nearly every hole that can lead to some awkward lies and challenging chips.
The primary defense of the course is the prevailing wind that will be blowing 10-20mph every day (gusting higher) and very firm, very fast fairways that force players to be exacting with how far we try and push drives down the fairways and around the numerous doglegs. Add in a couple of extremely narrow holes (pinched in by dense trees), small greens, and a type of Bermuda grass that I personally haven’t seen and you have yourself a good test.
I personally really like it. I like the fast, bouncy fairways and thinking about more than just carry numbers. I’m not the longest hitter in the world so the bounciness gives me an opportunity to play from similar spots as the long guys. And three of the four par 5’s are reachable for me thanks to the firm conditions which is not always the case.
The course did get some much needed rain on Tuesday so come tournament start, it may not be quite so bouncy (it was definitely softer in my Tuesday practice round), but assuming the sun stays out and wind blows like it is supposed to tomorrow, I’d imagine it will firm back up.
On an unrelated note, they have crocodiles roaming the little ponds on the course. I was speaking with the head pro here today and he personally introduced fifteen crocodiles into the pond off the fifteenth hole a couple of years ago. Golf pro and croc whisperer … truly a man of many talents!
The Field
The field this week is made up primarily of Aussie PGA Tour members with a sprinkling of international invites (my category) and “elite amateurs” from PNG and Australia who are being given a chance to play with the pros.
I’m not super familiar with a lot of the guys yet, but there are some names I recognize from first stage of DP World Tour Q-school when I played it in Australia a couple of years ago.
Looking at the participant list and associated playing categories, it’s clear this isn’t the strongest field in Aussie golf. I would imagine that has to do with the travel to get here plus the quirky-ness of the golf course. Not all of the big time, full status Aussie PGA tour members would choose to come out and play this one knowing that they can get into whatever tournament they want for the remainder of the year. That said, the winner from last year, Lachlan Barker, is back to defend his title and anecdotally from watching guys on the range, there is no shortage of talent.
The Preparation
Long range prep work has not been ideal due to the move, but tighten the time horizon and I’m fairly pleased with what I’ve been able to accomplish leading up to the event.
Between June 4th and August 11th, I had only played real, on course golf three and a half times. All of those were on the road trip and none of them were overly serious. Practice time was also limited given the selling and packing and cross country trip. I had a little less interaction with Dom during the period in question and while my game wasn’t bad, I HAD developed some bad habits. One thing I did do a decent job of was continuing to move my body and work out on the road. Kaylie and I prioritized our fitness during the trip and took advantage of hotel gyms (some good, some horrible).
When we arrived in Australia, I got back to work amidst the madness of setting up our home. I practiced every day leading up to leaving for Papa New Guinea, but it was limited to hitting balls off a mat at Melbourne Golf Academy and doing a bit of putting. No chipping, no range work on grass, no playing reps. And in direct opposition to the road trip, my workouts were deprioritized as our bodies got adjusted to the time zone and we battled through both kids getting sick immediately upon arrival.
Two days prior to leaving for PNG, I drove up to Ballarat (about two hours northwest of our home in Melbourne) to meet up with Dom and practice with him and Liam Howlett, another one of Dom’s students. Across the two days, we spent about eight hours practicing and a bit more playing nine holes. We addressed a number of core issues causing inconsistencies in my swing and spent time ingraining a better way of delivering the club to the ball. As usual with Dom, it was time incredibly well spent and I walked away from the mini-trip with a lot of confidence.
That confidence has traveled with me to PNG and through two days of tournament week, my swing feels good and I’m getting more comfortable with the changes we made over the weekend.
I was first out on Monday to play eighteen holes, see the course, and get used to the unique grasses and firm conditions. Most players arrived on Monday afternoon, so I essentially had the course to myself and was able to take my time marking up my yardage book. My primary focus, outside of determining the best way to play the course, was hitting as many chips and pitches as I could. The grain in these green surrounds here are going to make folks look silly at some point during the tournament. Anything into the grain is going to be hard to get the contact and control you really want, so catching ball first and getting the ball on the ground early will be key.
On Tuesday, after my morning workout and brekkie, I got over to the course early only to be held up by the first serious rain PNG has received in some time. We eventually got onto the course where I played the front nine, focusing on confirming what I saw in the first practice round and getting the ball in the hole (it sounds dumb but often times in practice rounds you’re so focused on putting to different spots on the green or hitting chips to potential tournament pin locations that you don’t actually hole out). Knowing that I have the eighteen hole pro-am to play in tomorrow, I opted to skip the back nine and grab lunch instead. A quick range session post-lunch and an hour of putting before catching the shuttle back to the hotel ended my day at the course.
Tomorrow, I’ll have a chance to play the course one more time in the pro-am. I’m really looking forward to meeting some locals and getting to know more about PNG through them. Outside of doing my best to play well for them, I will treat the round itself as an opportunity to make birdies and get into the right mindset for tomorrow.
I’m hopeful I can keep building off the momentum of the past few days. I’m just trying to keep things really simple and play MY game. It’s easy to watch some of these guys hit the ball and get tricked into thinking I need to hit it as far as them or hit the same fancy kinds of chips and pitches they make look so easy. I just keep reminding myself my game, as is, is good enough.
I’m going to try and write a quick post after every round this week, so keep an eye out for my emails. You can follow along with live scoring at the link I shared above … though time zone differences may make that a challenge for some of you!
I’ve also been posting pictures and updates to my instagram stories this week (@hazardsascent) and will continue to do so as much as possible, so feel free to follow along there.
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Appreciate all of the support out there. Keep climbing y’all!