Amateurs ready to challenge the pros

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Since 2011, theArcachon Open punctuates the French golfing season by giving professional and amateur players the opportunity to play, in three rounds of stroke play and on a course that meets high preparation criteria, a high-level event. Over the years, the names of the winners engraved on the trophy bear witness to the competitive nature of the event: Edouard Dubois (2011, 12), Xavier Poncelet (2015, 20), Robin Roussel (2017), Grégory Havret (2019) or even Sebastien Gros (2021) are thus among the essential champions of tricolor golf of the last decade. In parallel to the professional event was held an equally challenging amateur series, which offered participants the chance to compete in the first two rounds with the pros, before doing battle with each other on Sunday.

This organization now belongs to the past, since the Open d’Arcachon becomes this year a purely professional tournament… with a very large number of amateurs in the field. “It’s something we wanted to put in place from the start of the tournament, but which had not been possible until today”noted Luc Metivierthe creator and still organizer of the event. “It is now the case, and it is a very good thing for all the amateurs who come to us because they will be able to play with the pros until the end, within a single classification. The winner of the 2022 Arcachon Open on Sunday can therefore be an amateur player. » Without obviously being able to claim to pocket the check corresponding to their final classification, the amateurs will however have the opportunity to garner a number of points clearly higher than the World Amateur Golf Ranking (WAGR), the world ranking of their category.

Martin Couvra, without complexes

The news was greeted with smiles by Martin Couvraa member of the ffgolf Performance Center, who is about to take part in the event for the third consecutive year. “I find it cool, because it will allow you to confront them directly, whereas before there was no symbolism if you won among the amateurs since it was two separate rankings. If you played very well the first two days, you didn’t end up in the last game with the pros, but in the last game with the amateurs, three or four groups before the end. In terms of the public and the experience, it’s not going to be the same if it goes well for me or the other amateurs. And since it will bring a lot more points in the WAGR, it becomes really very interesting”noted the winner of the 2020 edition.

Top seed in a category that also includes Written by William Moundeguy, Nathan Legendre or Hugo Le GoffCouvra is this year one of the 108 players (72 pros and 36 amateurs) in the field, on an equal footing at the start with all the others, whatever their status. “I come with fairly high ambitions, that’s for sure, even if the fact that there is no longer an amateur series does not necessarily change the situation in itself since the objective is always to win the tournament, whether that either with pros or not »indicates the member of theFrench team who took 6th place Worlds this summer at the Golf National, and passed the cut at theOpen the France last month. “The fact of having played in such big tournaments as these means that when we arrive at less demanding tournaments, we feel much more comfortable, we are in a more pleasant position. I’m going to feel good, with relatively little pressure, and I can’t wait! » The pros are therefore warned: young amateur wolves have long teeth!