Silloth gets top amateur event

The English Amateur Championship will head to one of its most northerly outposts when it is played at Silloth-on-Solway in London Olympics year, 2012.

Also in the 2012 fixtures just released, Walton Heath will be the venue for the Brabazon Trophy while the Men’s County Finals will be staged at Beau Desert.

Silloth-on-Solway in Cumbria, proved a testing venue for the Logan Trophy (Mid-Amateur Championship) in July when the host club’s John Longcake proved a worthy winner.  This wasn’t the English Golf Union’s (EGU) first visit to the club. The Men’s County Finals were staged there in 1995 when Lancashire triumphed while in 2002 it hosted the annual England v Scotland Under 16 match.

While Silloth will be the main venue, Seascale, venue for the northern region qualifying this year and of the County Finals in 1971, will be the other course hosting the qualifying rounds.

Walton Heath will host the Brabazon Trophy in June, the only previous occasion the popular Surrey club has staged the English Open Stroke Play Championship was in 1968 when (Sir) Michael Bonallack triumphed in a tournament reduced to 54 holes after the second round was abandoned. 

However, the EGU has made regular visits to this superb 36-hole venue, the English Amateur being staged there on four occasions, the most recent in 2002 when Yorkshire’s Richard Finch was champion.

The 2012 domestic season will start with the international against France at Royal Mid Surrey on 12th – 13th May, followed, two days later, by the southern qualifying round for the Brabazon Trophy at the same venue. The northern qualifier will take place a week later at Worksop.

The English Seniors will venture into East Anglia for only the second time in its history when the Championship is played over the Suffolk courses of Aldeburgh and Thorpeness from 6th – 8th June, while the Seniors County Finals, the last event of the season, visit Heworth in Gateshead, Co Durham, in early October.