REIGNING Guyana Open champion Avinash Persaud won the Wartsila Golf Tournament on a Saturday that saw some high scores at the Lusignan Golf Club, thanks to very slick greens, tricky pin positions and strong winds.
Persaud’s Gross 78 was good enough to take the first prize of a brand new wedge, a box of golf balls and the trophy.
Second place went to the Best Net player Muntaz Haniff with a net 68, and third prize (second-best Gross) went to Colin Ming with a Gross 82. Fourth prize (net runner-up) went to Christine Sukhram net 71.
Nearest to the Pin winners were Mohanlall ‘Santo’ Dinnanauth and Roy Cummings.
The course was in good condition, although the rough remained very punitive for those straying from the fairways, and the rehabilitated bunkers also caused problems.
Add to that, extremely fast greens and pin positions that saw numerous three and four putts, and most players were put under some pressure to come remotely near to their handicaps.   
Wartsila, which is currently installing new generators in the country, went all out for the tournament thanks to team member Matti Wesslin who approached the club to sponsor the event.
In his presentation address club secretary William Walker said the Finnish-based company, had raised the sponsorship to a generous $350 000 and this was reflected in the quality prizes valued at $100 000 as well as free snacks and drinks for the players. The result was a large turnout of 40 players.
He noted that Wartsila, which was founded in 1834, currently has some 17 528 employees spread over 70 countries with a total revenue of 4.53 billion euros.
Wartsila powers every third ship, and services every second ship sailing the world’s seas and is a leading provider of power plants in distributed and flexible power generation.
Finally Walker expressed the hope that Wartsila wins more contracts here so Guyana could receive more reliable electricity and the club more great golf tournaments.
Wesslin, in his remarks, thanked the ground staff for their hard work to get the course in shape and the executive for organising the event. He said he would indeed work to ensure that at least for 2012 there would be a similar tournament.
This long weekend will see the return of sponsor Sanjay’s Jewellery on Saturday and on Monday a farewell tournament for Canadian High Commissioner Francois Montour.