Bendigo golfer Andrew Martin will take to the course this weekend for his second tournament on home soil in recent weeks.
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Martin will be playing at the 103rd Australian Open, to be held at The Lakes Golf Club in Sydney.
“I’ve played at The Lakes before and it’s similar to one of my home courses, Peninsula Kingswood Country Club,” Martin said.
“The greens are similar. However, it’s not exactly one of the courses I prefer to play, but as a golfer we play on a mixture of courses.”
The Lakes has hosted the Open multiple times with legends of the game such as Jack Nicklaus (1964), Greg Norman (1980), Geoff Ogilvy (2010) and Peter Senior (2012) having won the national tournament.
The par 72 Michael Clayton designed course has many impressive holes, but the most challenging is said to be the 280m par 4 13th.
The hole has a downhill 70m wide fairway with a green modelled off the fourth hole at Melbourne’s prestigious Woodlands Golf Club, which is protected by steep banks which can result in players finding it difficult to walk off the green with a birdie.
The Lakes is located less than five kilometres from Sydney’s Botany Bay, which brings winds that can cause chaos for golfers.
“It’s always a challenge,” Martin said.
“The forecast shows some wind this week, it’s going to be tough out on the course.
“The course doesn’t exactly suit me so it will present many challenges which I will need to overcome.”
Martin will tee off in the third-last group on Thursday at 1.20pm, alongside Rory Bourke and Michael Wright.
The Open’s player field includes star Americans Matt Kuchar, Brandt Snedeker and Keegan Bradley.
Martin will go into the Open after finishing T47 at the NSW Open at Twin Creeks Golf Club last weekend.
“Nothing really worked for me last weekend. So I treated it as a practice round in the lead-up to the Open,” he said.
“I just struggled to get it all together out on the course.”
Martin predominantly plays on the Asian Tour and to retain his tour card, he needs to finish within the top 60 players within the Habitat for Humanity standings to secure a spot in the 2019 season.
“My goal is to finish within the top 60 players, I could possibly scrape through at around 63 in the rankings,” Martin said.
“However, I’d much prefer to be within the top 60 to be safe.”
Martin currently sits in 66th position on the standings, having played 13 Asian Tour events throughout the season and still has two more to play before the end of the year.
His best finish of the year so far was T5 (-11) at the Asia Pacific Classic held at St Andrews Golf Club in Henan, China.
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