THUNDER BAY – Bragging rights are on the line Sunday night at On The Links.
A team of Thunder Bay golfers is squaring off with a squad from the St. Croix National Golf and Event Center in Wisconsin for a virtual “Border Battle” match-up that gets underway at 6 p.m.
“This is definitely getting everyone fired up here to get the season going, especially since the snow is almost gone,” said On The Links owner Chris Ferguson.
“We have eight, two-person teams taking part, and to be honest we probably could have had even more with the amount of interest that we had before we even started to advertise this tournament.”
The event came together over the last couple of months through conversations with Ferguson and fellow Thunder Bay product Joe Stephens, who now lives in Wisconsin and works at St. Croix.
“He knew about us and said ‘we have the high definition simulators here in Wisconsin and we know you guys have it there, so why not try to get a tournament together and get some exposure for everybody,’” Ferguson said.
“If you can kind of envision people playing on their Xboxes, they have the access to play with players from all over the world. It’s the same thing here with these golf simulators.”
The 16 golfers will be playing to their respective handicapped grouping to determine who’s the best between Thunder Bay and St. Croix.
They will be playing on the virtual version of the Bay Hill Club, which is located outside of Orlando, Fla., and plays host to the PGA Tour’s Arnold Palmer Invitational each year.
“We’ve been trying to practice on it here over the last few weeks,” Ferguson said.
“It’s a fairly long course and the putting is pretty tricky, but when you have the players like we do on our squad, I think we’re going to do really well in this tournament.”
The Thunder Bay squad is headlined by former Strathcona Invitational winner Conor Carr and his partner Corey Merritt.
“Corey’s only been golfing for a couple of years now but he’s a super good player,” Ferguson said. “He’s already around a three or four handicap in a short period of time.”
Sunday’s event is the first of two planned match-ups between the two countries.
The Thunder Bay group has received an invite to go down to St. Croix and play at the Wisconsin course over the Labour Day weekend.
“That should be a lot of fun and we’re hoping to get them to come up and play in Thunder Bay at some point,” Ferguson said.
“We’re hoping this will be a gateway for other virtual tournaments as well. We’re actually talking with the owners of the Up and Down Lounge in Sault Ste. Marie about doing something with them during the Masters weekend in April, so we’re letting everyone know to keep an eye out for that.”
Further information on Sunday’s Border Battle and future virtual tournaments can be found on the On The Links Facebook page.
