Stage set for showdown

Besides defending champion Sweden’s Sebastian Soderberg, a number of past Barclays Kenya Open golf Championship winners and European Tour players will be parading at the par 71 Muthaiga Golf Club course from Thursday.

They will be seeking a share of the Sh24.4 million (220,000 Euros) total prize kitty where the winner will take home Sh3.5 million (32,000 Euro plus a chance to join the big league (Road to Dubai’s European Tour).

During last year’s Open at Karen Country Club, Soderberg fired rounds of 67, 68, 68 and 67 for an impressive 18 under par 270.

But unlike many past Kenya Open champions who usual climb the ladder to the big league, Soderberg did not perform well in the remaining part of the Challenge Tour and has returned to Kenya to try his lack again in this year’s series.

The Barclays Kenya Open is once again the first event in the 2017 Challenge Tour series, a development tour which has over the years produced top players.

Other past winners who will compete in the event are South Africa’s Jake Roos who won it in 2014 at Karen Club, England’s Gary Boyd (2009) and Robert Dinwiddie (2010).

Soderberg has entered through category one (2016) Challenge Tour or “Road to Oman’’ events winners were other players in that category include Spaniard Alvaro Velassco, Frenchman Adrien Saddier and Swede Simon Forsstrom.

Players in category five (leading 25 players in the Tour Qualifying School) set for the event include Max Orrin from Northern Ireland and Germany’s Sebastian Hiesle who tied in fourth on 11 under par last year.

Those and many budding pros are expected to battle it out in the event which marks its 49th anniversary and which has been a Challenge Tour event since 1991.

A field of 156 in all, including 22 Kenyan pros and six local amateurs, will line up at Muthaiga on Thursday morning. But before the first round, there will be two Pro-Am events on Tuesday and on Wednesday, where some of the pros will team up with local amateurs, mostly business executives from the various corporate sponsors.

The Open returns to its original venue Muthaiga after a five-year absence. Barclays Bank of Kenya has been the title sponsor since 2011, having signed a contract with the Open organisers Kenya Open Golf Limited.