Daily Times

LAHORE: Ahmad Baig, who can easily be classified as God’s gift to the golfing arenas of Pakistan, won the 8th Chief of Naval Staff Amateur Golf Championship that concluded at the Defence Raya Golf Course here Sunday. Ahmad was successful in intimidating his fellow competitors and after curbing their challenge, carved out a triumph for himself through incredible excellence. A victory of this prestige and honour and lucrative in terms of cash prize on offer was not something new for him but in the process he did left behind many champions in disarray and anguish. And the most affected one was his golfing mate Zohaib Asif from DHA, Karachi who had to concede the title without offering any resistance.

Not that Zohaib played poorly, it was the awesome form displayed by Ahmad that made him fearsome and a golfer of might. During the three rounds, Ahmad had a score of 65 on the first day, a national record breaking 60 on the second day and again a 66 on the final day. The aggregate added up to 191, twenty five under par, a score that reflected perfection of the level once shown by the world renowned Tiger Woods during his hey days and also visible was command in application of golfing skills that any world class champion would love to emulate.

At the start of the final round yesterday, Ahmad was too far ahead of his competitors and even a modest round would have been sufficient to ensure victory. But this youngster started to compete against himself and fashioned out shots and putting strokes that fetched a most impressive under par round of 66. Birdies came where ever he so wished and totalled seven and then the regulation pars were carded on ten holes. Another significant feature was that he had only one bogie on the closing 18th hole where he suffered as he attempted to hit a two on shot on the par 5, closing hole and landed in the water. During the course of the three days, Ahmad had 26 birdies which again is a record for any golf championship in Pakistan. For this glorified performance, Ahmad not only won the CNS title but also a five marla plot in Islamabad.

Other positions in gross section were attained by Zohaib Asif of Islamabad who ended up as the runner-up with a gross aggregate score of 219. Third position went to Zunair Aleem Khan (Defence Raya). His score was 220. Fourth gross was fetched by Ashiq Hussain (Multan), his score being 223. In the race for honours in the net category, Mohsen Zafar (Lahore Gymkhana) won first net prize with a score of net 215. Net second was Dr Aleem ur Rehman (Lahore Gymkhana), his score being 214 net. Umair Butt (Royal Palm) claimed third net and his score was 215. Nearest to the pin winner was Syed Yasser Akber and longest drive was hit by Brig Haroon Malik.

Published in Daily Times, November 19^th 2018.