Tag: Golfweek Senior Challenge Cup

2022 Golfweek Senior Challenge Cup features stacked field

The 2022 Golfweek Senior Challenge Cup is more than just the penultimate event of the season.

The 2022 Golfweek Senior Challenge Cup is more than just the final ranking tournament of the season. It’s an opportunity to share camaraderie, stories and plenty of healthy rivalries.

The 54-hole stroke play event will be at Jacaranda Golf Club just outside of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, and features four different age groups ranging from 55 to over 75 years old. Aside from crowning individual medalists in each age division, the Challenge Cup features a team aspect as well.

Not only are bragging rights and player of the year points up for grabs, but crucial World Amateur Golf Rankings points. The top 20 ranked senior amateur men in WAGR are exempt into the 2023 U.S. Senior Amateur. Although the points race for the U.S. senior am ends in August, every event matters.

Captaining the two teams are 2022 Golfweek/USA Today Sports Player of the Year Rusty Strawn and 2020 Golfweek/USA Today Sports Player of the Year Craig Hurlbert. Strawn is coming off an incredible year that was highlighted by wins at the U.S. and Canadian senior amateurs. Hurlbert is getting back in the playing saddle after taking time off to upstart a venture, raising over a billion dollars in investment capital for his newest company, Local Bounti.

Backing them is plenty of firepower: 2021 U.S. Open low amateur Billy Mitchell, Golfweek No. 2-ranked senior am Kevin Vandenberg and 2022 Yancey Ford Award winner Joe Pavoni.

If you want to play premier courses across the country and test your skills against the best senior amateur golfers, check out the 2023 Golfweek senior amateur golf schedule.

Let the battle begin: Gene Elliott, Ken Kinkopf captain this week’s Golfweek Senior Challenge Cup

Players teeing it up at PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, this week land on one of two teams: Gene Elliott’s or Ken Kinkopf’s.

At the Golfweek Senior Challenge Cup, there’s a tournament within a tournament. Players teeing it up at PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, this week land on one of two teams: the one captained by Gene Elliott or the opposing team captained by Ken Kinkopf.

Of course, neither man is a bad choice to lead, given their golf resumes. Elliott is the No. 1-ranked senior amateur in the world and Kinkopf was named the 2019 Golfweek Player of the Year.

In dividing the field into teams, each captain got to make his 10 captain’s picks. The rest of each team was filled by blind draw (if not for COVID, teams would have been filled out in a pairings party). Each team’s score will be made up of the low 25 percent of that team’s individuals scores.

Pairings: Golfweek Senior Challenge Cup

As usual, there are four divisions in which players are competing at the Senior Challenge Cup: Senior (55-64), Super Senior (65-69), Legends (70-74), Super Legends (75+). They are loaded with top senior amateur talent.

At the top of the list, of course, are Elliott and Kinkopf. Elliott was runner-up at the British Senior Amateur and won the Canadian Senior Amateur in 2019. He just won his fifth Iowa Senior Amateur title. Kinkopf racked up several senior victories last season, including the Golfweek Player of the Year Classic, Senior Masters and Jack Hesler titles.

Reigning U.S. Senior Amateur champion Bob Royak will play, as well as Doug Hanzel, the 2013 U.S. Senior Amateur winner who also won the Jones Cup Senior and the Florida Senior Azalea in 2019.

Craig Hurlbert is currently the No. 1-ranked player in the Golfweek Senior National Rankings. Dan Parkinson remains in South Florida this week after winning the super senior division of last week’s the Golfweek U.S. Super Senior, Legends, and Super Legends National Championship.

In addition to the team challenge, there is an important individual perk on the line this week, too. The Golfweek Senior Challenge Cup is a WAGR counting tournament, and the top 15 in the WAGR rankings get an automatic exemption into the 2021 U.S. Senior Amateur at The Country Club of Detroit.

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