The 21st ABGR-American Express Golf Tournament 2014 was successfully staged recently at Dirab Golf & Country Club with 140 players teeing it up in two starts Thursday and Friday.

Most of the players in the field (108) took to the superbly set up Dirab golf course on Friday while a further 32 played on Thursday.

The team of Paul Siffre, I. Mahmcrana, P. Rodney Clarke and Christine Buchner combined for a net score of 53 to win the four-ball Texas Scramble format competition by two strokes from the team of Graham Gunn. The winning team with an 8 handicap put together a gross score of 61.

Gunn and teammates Ian Hunter, Stephen Taylor and George Baaklini were runner-up on 55.

Taking the third position one stroke further back at 56 was the quartet of Stuart Halliday, Jerry D. Carlos, Romesh Elapata and Cindy Clarke. They returned a gross score of 66.

Roy Evans, John Molony, Kapila Nanayak and Neels Burger took fourth place on countback from the team of Chris E. Maslak, Martina O’Reilly, Liz Kennedy and Roger Schaere, after the sides tied on 58. When the scores were compared to break the tie, Evans team won out with a better backnine score of 33 to the 35 by Maslak’s squad.

The awards for men’s and ladies longest drives went to Shane Kenneally and Susan Tessier, respectively. Abdul Al Othman took home the prize for closest to the pin.

Like in the past stagings of the event participants got to enjoy the hospitality that has become the hallmark of the tournament run by the American Busines Group of Riyadh with American Express as the title sponsor.

The ABGR through Chairman Tom Walter would like to thank Dirab Golf Club and owner Khaled Abunayyan for making their facilities available for the tournament. He also thanked the corporate sponsors as follows: Platinum sponsors Hertz, Gama Dental Clinic; gold sponsors PHD-Pizza Hut, Marriott Riyadh Hotel; silver sponsors Dirab Golf & Country Club, Atheeb Holding, bronze sponsors Saudi Aviation Flight Academy, Exxon Mobil, UPS and Aramex, and hole sponsors Kleemann, Outback, and Arabian Shield Insurance.

The tournament was held under the ABGR Golf Committee chairmanship of Tom Merkel and with the leadership of committee member/volunteers Christy Roe, Bouchaib El Jadiani, George Baaklini, Jason Mundi, John Spitz, Barbara Merkel, Chris Maslak, Roy Adams, Pat Campion, Mohamed Ayaz and Charlene Perilla. The AMEX management team led by Priyan Attygalle, CEO of AMEX Saudi Arabia, was also present for the duration of the tournament.

Capping the event was the awards dinner where team winners and individual awardees received their prizes.

ABGR has over 400 members consisting of American companies with long track records in the Kingdom, American businesses and entrepreneurs that are relatively new to the country and Saudi companies activiely promoting the imporation of American goods and services to Saudi Arabia.