Jeev Milkha Singh diary: Wow! Tournament abandoned!

What a debut it has been for my Senior Tour career.

The rain keeps falling here in Mauritius!

The mantra for the Legends Tour and professional golf tournaments around the world, is ‘play where the pros play’ and to showcase wonderful golf courses in great condition and situated in attractive golfing destinations. Golf tourism is one of the resulting benefits for venues as well as an ROI for tournament sponsors.

We have just been unlucky this week in Mauritius at Constance Belle Mare Plage.

We got on the golf course today (Saturday) but we managed only two holes before the golf course became flooded, and I went bogey – bogey.

The Legends Tour organisers, along with the title sponsors MCB decided that the tournament should be abandoned after two days, as the weather forecast is not good. There was an 85% chance of rain today (Sat) and 75% chance tomorrow (Sun), and, apparently, here in the Indian Ocean, the weather gurus are always pretty accurate with no local variances.

I have played in a couple of abandoned golf tournaments in my career, but it is so rare.

We are all given a fee, in lieu of prizefund, for participation in the Pro-Am and all trying to complete my first Senior Tour event.

This amount obviously does not count to any career or Order of Merit Rankings, but a nice gesture from all concerned.

Tomorrow (Sunday) we will play the Alliance Competition, to try and complete and announce a result of 18 holes; that is the Pro-Amateur Betterball Division.

I will complete my last six holes with my partner Ryan Howson, the Legends Tour boss. It shows how keen and competitive the guy is at golf.

I will fly out tomorrow (Sunday) to Japan to play in next week’s Kanehide Senior Okinawa Open Golf Tournament (April 7th – 9th, 2022) at Kanehide Kise CC, where we are playing for Yen 32,000,000 on the Japan Senior Tour. Another debut for me!

Then I have a week off to do a full spec and club fitting on my Callaway golf clubs in Japan, before playing my second of three events on the Japan Senior Tour in the Yen 50,000,000 Nojima Champion Cup Senior ProGolf Tournament (21st – 22nd April, 2022) at Hakpone CC at Kanagawa.

I then expect to be back in Dubai in the first week of May and will then plan my 2022 season’s schedule. Let’s hope the next few tournaments and the rest of the year go a little more smoothly and as scheduled!

Farewell from a rather damp Mauritius! See you soon!

- Jeev Milkha Singh is a Dubai Golden VISA Awardee and Dubai resident. Jeev who turned 50 in December, 2021, was the first player from India to play on the DP World Tour. He has won four tournaments on the DP World Tour, four on the Japan Golf Tour, six on the Asian Tour and seven other global titles in Malaysia, India, Thailand and on the Korean Tour.