Major Championships in 2016 and Rio 2016™ Olympics: What to expect?
The sport of golf is set to return to the Olympics after more than 100 years of absence, when a total of 60 players from all over the world will participate in a 72-hole stroke-play event at the Rio 2016™ Olympics.
The event will feature top-15 players in the Official World Golf Rankings and maximum four from each participating country.
However, it is too early to say which players will make it to the Olympics, as the event is expected to compete with some of the major events on the regular Tours.
The final dates for the summer games have not been finalized yet. However, they are likely to be scheduled around July or August.
In that case, the staging of The Open Championship and the PGA Championship, along with the World Golf Championship – Bridgestone Invitational, will get into jeopardy.
The organizers have already started thinking about changing the schedule of the PGA Tour that can allow the players to participate in each of the big events in the world of golf.
Golf will be played at the Games for the first time in more than a century. Therefore, players would love to earn the first ever gold medal of the century.
In the meantime, one cannot miss the opportunity of participating in the major championships, as they are no doubt the most celebrated golf tournaments.
Rory McIlroy, who became a golfing sensation after a record-margin victory at the 2011 US Open, expressed his feelings about the 2016 Olympics while he was participating in this year’s Bridgestone Invitational.
He said that it will be a great honour for him to be a part of the Olympic field in 2016 and the feeling will be the same for every player around the world.
However, he will never compromise his participation in any of the major tournaments if they conflict with the Olympics dates. He said that Olympics can never be compared to the four major championships, at least for now.
According to him, the Games might achieve a value like majors but it will take time until the sport establishes itself in the summer Games that are held after every four years.
There are players like McIlroy who still believe that a Green Jacket or a Claret Jug is worth more than a gold medal.
On the other hand, there are players like Francesco Molinari who are desperately waiting for the 2016 Games so that they can represent their country in their respective sport.
“I think any sportsman, no matter in what discipline, dreams about competing in the Olympics and for the Olympic medal,” Molinari told the Plain Dealer.
“It’s been great the last couple of days to watch London and think that in four years we might get a chance to be there. Even just watching on TV, it’s a special event and the atmosphere is something really unique”.
If looked in a broader context, it is obvious that the game officials will never want the regular and Olympic tournaments to conflict with each other. Olympics have always been the most watched games in the history.
Therefore, the officials will not take the risk of losing their fan base, especially when there is a chance that the top players may choose the Olympics over regular tournaments.
The Executive Director of the Bridgestone Invitational Don Padgett recently confirmed that the tournament officials plan to change the dates to early summer in order to give a chance to every player to participate in both the events in 2016.
“Obviously, all the best players will be in the Olympics and we expect them to be a part of the World Golf Championships as well,” Padgett told the Plain Dealer reporter Tim Rogers.
Yet, many players will still skip some tournaments in order to get prepared for the big stage.
Jason Dufner, who plays on the PGA Tour, commented that he will straightforwardly miss the Bridgestone Invitational if he gets a chance to represent his country in the Olympics.
By and large, if there will be a conflict in dates between the regular and four-yearly games, the game officials will have to work really hard in order to attract the players for each of the events.
Otherwise, a time will come when the anti-Olympic-golf forces will start pressurising the officials to revoke their decision and it will again lose its status as an Olympic sport as it happened in 1904.
The views expressed in this article are the writer's own and in no way represent Bettor.com's official editorial policy.
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