IRISH international Keith Nolan paid tribute to the Royal & Ancient ahead of Britain and Ireland's bid for the Eisenhower Trophy which begins in the Philippines today.
The 23-year-old from Bray won the Hong Kong Open Amateur title at the weekend and saw his team-mates Barclay Howard, Gary Wolstenholme and Michael Brooks fill three of the next four places. "The R & A had the foresight to finance the stop-over in Hong Kong and it has given us a chance to acclimatise to the conditions that we will be facing," said Nolan.
A final year student at East Tennessee State University, where he majors in speech communications, Nolan looks to be in peak form having recently, switched to a new putter.
For the first two rounds are the Southwoods Golf and Country Club both the Legends and Masters courses will be, used and, at over 7,000 yards, they favour the long hitters.a The recent heavy rain is likely to make them play even longer and officials have brought in helicopters in a bid to dry out the fairways.
The weather conditions that forced last week's Women's World Championships for the Espirito Santo Trophy to be curtailed to 54 holes could again prove a problem. Although the weather has been fair for the early practice rounds the forecast is ominous with the chance of a hurricane hitting the area.
Non-playing captain Clive Brown, who led Britain and Ireland to Walker Cup success at Royal Porthcawl last year, has been taking antibiotics after almost losing his voice. His mood however, remains upbeat: "All four players are hitting the ball well and I am quietly confident," said Brown.
Britain and Ireland have won the Eisenhower on three previous occasions but never outside Europe. Their victories came in Italy in 1964, Portugal in 1976 and Sweden in 1988.
