LAWLOR SET TO DEFEND G4D OPEN TITLE IN WALES
Ireland’s Brendan Lawlor prepares for his title defence at The G4D Open at Celtic Manor Resort. (Photo: R&A)
Ireland’s Brendan Lawlor and Daphne van Houten from the Netherlands will look to defend their respective titles at this week’s G4D Open, being held at the Celtic Manor Resort in Wales for the first time (14-16 May).
Leading golfers with a disability are set to compete on the world stage at the fourth edition of the Championship after three years at Woburn.
The G4D Open, staged in partnership with The R&A and the DP World Tour and supported by EDGA, is one of the most inclusive championships ever held.
Eighty men and women players of amateur and professional status will compete across 54 holes of gross stroke play at the renowned Roman Road Course, with overall men’s and women’s winners and trophies earned in each of the nine sport classes across the recognised impairment groups which cover Standing, Intellectual, Visual and Sitting.
Lawlor is looking forward to the new challenge at Celtic Manor: “The course looks quite open, a little bit different to Woburn. It looks like you can open up the shoulders a bit more this week. I'll try and take advantage of the downwind holes, get it in the air. I’ll try to score and put myself in the last group on Saturday.
"The work The R&A and DP World Tour have done at this Championship is truly incredible. From the very first year, from Woburn, to where it is now. The most different thing I see is the amount of new players we have, and who are going to be contesting at the end of the week.
“There's a guy actually from Ireland, Conal Flynn, who is 17. I did a video with him a few years ago in Ireland. He has dwarfism, same as me, and he's playing here this week. Stories like that, to see the young generation come up, is great.
“I’m playing well. I've done a lot of travelling at the start of the year and been in Australia and America. I've been playing a lot of golf, probably more of a busier winter than I'd usually have. It's nice to get out and just feel ready coming here.”
The global field features representatives from 25 nations, five more than last year. The age range of players goes from the youngest in Sweden's 16-year-old Ville Engqvist to Japan's 70-year-old Shigeru Kobayashi as the oldest participant.
Among those are 19 players making their debut, including Richie Willis, a member at Celtic Manor for 25 years, who has played an estimated 3,000 rounds on the Roman Road lay-out.
Willis, 68, whose life dramatically changed after he needed an above-the-knee right leg amputation following a road traffic accident, will fittingly have the honour of striking the first tee shot at 8am tomorrow. He is one of two Welsh players in the field along with Dylan Baines.
England’s Lucy Leatham, another first-time player, is among 14 women in the field, having become aware of the Championship since last year's edition after a life-changing car accident in late 2023 saw her lose her right arm.
The top four men’s players on the World Ranking for Golfers with Disability (WR4GD) all tee up – world number one and 2024 Champion Kipp Popert of England, Simon Seungmin Lee from the Republic of Korea, Australia’s Lachlan Wood and Lawlor.
Lawlor, 29, who has a rare condition called Ellis–van Creveld syndrome, claimed a four-stroke win over Wood last year to add to his title success in 2023.
Three out of the top four women on the WR4GD are also ready to shine, namely world number one van Houten, Mette Wegge Lynggaard from Denmark and Germany’s Jennifer Sräga. A year ago, van Houten, 27, who was born with scoliosis and since faced other health battles, claimed back-to-back women’s titles thanks to an 11-stroke victory over Sräga.
"I'm really excited to be at Celtic Manor. It's beautiful, the scenery is amazing here. It will be good to defend my title and I'm excited to try and do that,” said van Houten.
“However, I've had long COVID for three years now and I'm not practising as much as I did in the past. It's really been catching up with me and I feel very tired. It makes you less confident and less comfortable. But I am confident that I will try to put everything into the three rounds and give it my all – that's all you can do.”
In preparation for hosting The G4D Open, the course has undergone a rigorous assessment and enhancement programme to ensure it meets the highest standards of accessibility.
In a first for the Championship, there will be a cut to the leading 20 overall men and ties and top ten overall women and ties. In addition, the top three men in each sport class (if applicable) and top two women in each sport class (if applicable) will also qualify for the third and final round.
The Roman Road staged three editions of the Wales Open on the DP World Tour from 2005-2007 while the Twenty Ten Course was being built for the Ryder Cup. It also played host to the Wales Senior Open in 2015 and 2016.