Sideline Sid Sports correspondant & historian www.sunlive.co.nz

While many look on golf as boring, the finish to the New Zealand Open played at Queenstown over the weekend had high drama aplenty on the last hole.

The rare Sky television coverage of a New Zealand professional tournament captured the drama where a two shot turnaround on the last hole, saw Aussie Mathew Griffin sneak past Hideto Tanihana from Japan to grab the big prize.

One local golf event that sneaks under the radar is the Western Bay five course tournament played in idyllic weather conditions each January.

A little help from my friend Mr Google, revealed that the annual event attracts around five hundred players with the vast majority being visitors to the region.

Throughout the year, we read on SunLive about the financial benefits brought in the Western Bay of Plenty, by the various sporting and cultural events that are held in our fair city.

Sideline Sid thinks that the annual five course tournament must be up there with the other Western Bay events, in terms of the money that the golfers spend in nearly a week in the Western Bay of Plenty.

Much of the success of the tournament is built upon the friendly Western Bay welcome and the opportunity to play five different golf courses in five days.

The burgeoning overseas entries each year are the result of giving the visitors a unique kiwi experience.

The five courses at Tauranga, Mount Maunganui, Omanu, Omokoroa and Te Puke that make up the tournament venues, are all uniquely different. All five courses are within a 30 minute drive of Tauranga City CBD, which is unheard of in other cities at home and around the world.

The Tauranga Golf Club that borders the Tauranga racecourse dates back over 100 years.

In earlier times, there was a course situated around the Tauranga Domain area, but golf has been played at what is known as the Gate Pa course since plans were drawn up by Auckland golf professional Fred Rutter in 1914.

Mount Maunganui Golf Club had a chequered start to the beautiful course of today.

Originally established in 1935, when the Mount had a minuscule population of just 450 residents, the course was sold in 1941 before being re-established in 1947.

The Mount Maunganui Golf Club was the home of the New Zealand PGA tournament in the 1960's and 1970's and attracted some of the best players in the world to the early January tournament each year.

British Open winners Peter Thompson and Kel Nagle were regular visitors to the Mount Maunganui PGA and in the 1970's a number of top Japanese players would make the trip to Mount Maunganui.

Omanu Golf Club, which is no more than a drive and a couple of three irons from the Mount course, was established around 40 years ago.

The original Te Puke Golf Club course was a tight and testing track adjacent to the main highway, before making the move over the railway lines to their current expansive course on the road to Whakatane.

The Omokoroa Golf Club, which was originally known as the Western Bay of Plenty Golf course, followed Omanu into life in the mid 1970's to give the Western Bay region five championship golf courses.

The stunning inner harbour views are alone worth the drive out to the Omokora course.

Our region is truly blessed to have five championship courses, along with the likes of the nine hole courses at Otumoetai and Renner Park for the casual golfer, which makes golf readily available to all skill levels of the game.