Big Canyon
Richard Dunn
If there's a local golfer with a legitimate chance of winning the
U.S. Women's Mid-Amateur championship, it's Marianne Towersey of Santa
Ana Country Club.
The national championship for women amateurs 25 and older will be
played at Big Canyon Country Club in Newport Beach Oct. 3-8, and
Towersey, the women's course-record holder at Big Canyon, qualified for
the event Tuesday on her home course, Santa Ana, which was one of several
sites around the country to host qualifying rounds.
Towersey and Karen Mabli of Palos Verdes shared medalist honors with a
76 in the one-day qualifier at Santa Ana Country Club, where 94 players
were vying for 19 spots. Towersey was the only local player to qualify.
Last month in the semifinals of the Women's Southern California Golf
Association match-play championships at Oakmont Country Club in Glendale,
Mabli defeated Towersey, 1 up in 19 holes, before capturing the title.
Towersey, however, came back the next day to win the fourth annual Tea
Cup Classic at Big Canyon, her third straight Newport-Mesa community
title in the Fletcher Jones Motorcars/Daily Pilot Club Championship
Series.
Towersey, the Daily Pilot's reigning queen of golf, set the Big Canyon
course record at 3-under-par 69 while playing as a guest on April 25.
There will be few rounds under 70 during the women's mid-amateur,
considering the teeth at Big Canyon (severe greens and hilly lies off the
fairway).
Alissa Herron, 27, is the defending champion of the women's
mid-amateur, which started in 1987. Towersey turns 50 in January.
While yours truly was on vacation, Towersey captured the Santa Ana
women's club championship on Aug. 25, her 16th title in the last 19
years. The club championship was postponed to August because of inclement
weather. Nicole Ronald finished as runner-up in Santa Ana's championship
flight.
On the heels of a banner summer in the golf community, we begin our
catching up with a belated congratulations on his retirement to former
Hoag Hospital orthopedic surgeon Dr. Michael Drucker.
Without Drucker, things wouldn't be the same in Newport Beach.
And that includes some of you walking down fairways today after knee
replacement surgery.
Drucker, who specialized in sports injuries, was one of the largest
individual contributors in the history of the former Newport Classic
Pro-Am, which later merged with the Toshiba Senior Classic from an
operational standpoint. The Newport Classic proved to the PGA Tour that
it could stand on its own two feet.
