NGC News:

5/13/09 - Tournaments are under way

Thanks again to all who have agreed to host our event. Our tournaments are now underway and don't forget that if you happen to come up short of your objective with the your first event you may host another one (and the results will be added to your first event) before july 15th, 2009.

Our first Regional Finals will be hosted on August 9th, 2009 at some of our sites across the country. Please go to our Regional Finals Course listing to check the date for your event.

Congrats to all our Regional Qualifiers from our courses who have completed their events. If you did not qualify at your site you still have plenty of time to enter again at many of our other participating courses. Please check our listings for your state on our Local Host Sites page.

3/29/09 - Regional Finals Host Sites

We're still watching the map for the best locations for our additional Regional Sites. We want to thank all of you who submitted a Regional Finals Host Site Request form and let you know that all were considered, or are still being considered, based on the site participation in your area.

How do we choose? Well, we have a huge wall map where we plot every course that registers each year. When we begin to see some clusters in an area and we can reasonably circle 12-15 sites, we then look for the prime geographic locations to allow the most people a reasonable drive time. Unfortunately, we do have some areas that participation is low and these particular sites will have further to go to attend the Regional. For this reason we have usually set up a Regional Site in Las Vegas and offered a free practice round to those who are going to have to travel a long distance. It seems as though Vegas has the cheapest plane tickets from about anywhere and.. well.. after all, it is Las Vegas!

2/23/09 - Rules & Regulations Update - Eligibility

We have modified our Rules and Regulations to address the requests for more clarity and allow more players to be eligible to participate. We hope this change simplifies our eligibility requirements and removes any confusion the prior language caused. Our thanks to all those who provided us feedback regarding this clause.

A new revised copy of the Rules and Regulations incorporating this wording is now available on our PDF Downloads - Forms page.

The old wording read:

2. Team Composition

a. Teams: Teams in the ESPN National Golf Challenge may be formed by any combination of male and female participants (two men, one man and one woman, two women).

b. Eligibility: Net/Senior Net division players employed with the following companies may participate in the ESPN National Golf Challenge at the Local level only, but are ineligible to advance to the Regional Finals or National Finals: an employee, officer, director or agent of ESPN, Inc., The Walt Disney Company, the Hearst Corporation, the applicable Host Site, or any of their respective licensees, assigns, parents, affiliated or subsidiary companies, nor an immediate family member or a member of the same household of any such individual.

The revised wording is now:

2. Team Composition

a. Teams: Teams in the ESPN National Golf Challenge may be formed by any combination of male and female participants (two men, one man and one woman, two women).

b. Eligibility: Net/Senior Net division players employed by ESPN may participate in the ESPN National Golf Challenge at the Local level only, but are ineligible to advance to the Regional Finals or National Finals.

1/17/09 - New Seniors Division

We've been listening to your suggestions and think this is a really good idea! So, 2009 will be our first year for your players who are (or will be) age 55 or older to participate in their own division.

We'll offer an advanced set of tees at the Regionals and National Finals specifically for these players to enjoy our event even more. The division will be "Net" only (handicapped) based on our normal handicap guidelines and our finalists will compete on their own challenging golf courses at the home of our National Finals, The Las Vegas Paiute Golf Resort.

We look forward to hosting our new Senior Division and hope they feel that they have finally found a national event designed for their significant contribution to the game of golf.

12/12/08 - Seasons Greetings

Seasons Greetings and Happy Holidays to all.

Thanks to all our players and pros for an exciting and record setting year. We look forward to enhancing your experience in our event with the new Seniors Division and expanding our Triple Play format to include many more sites in the coming season.

Be sure to tune in ESPN2 on December 14th at 11:00AM EST for the broadcast of the 2008 National Finals.

Photos from the 2008 National Finals have been uploaded and may be viewed and/or downloaded from the Gallery Link at the top of our pages. Most of the photos came out nicely, but, unfortunately some of the action shots on one afternoon were less than the quality we anticipated. We hope you still enjoy them.

10/27/08 - National Finals Summary

Vegas! Need we say more? Great weather, great courses and a great field contributed to the largest national finals in our history! Our thanks to all our participants for a most enjoyable event.

The 2008 ESPN National Golf Challenge National Finals were completed on Sunday Oct 26, 2008. The National Finals will be broadcast as a one hour special on ESPN2 Dec 14, 2008 at 11:00AM EST. We extend our congratulations to all participants. Listed below are the top 3 positions in each division:

The complete list of Amateur scoring can be found in our Gallery section for Amateur Finalists. More details and pictures will be available soon.

10/10/08 - Welcome to the National Finals!

We look forward to providing all of our finalists with a rewarding experience at our National Finals. The 2008 finals will host the largest number of Amateurs and Club Pros in our history!

Our official host hotel, Treasure Island Resort & Casino, will serve as the hub for all of our transportation, lodging and functions for the event. The Las Vegas Paiute Golf Resort with their three championship Pete Dye layouts will be in excellent condition and challenging our participants from tee to green.

On behalf of ESPN, our charities and sponsors, Welcome to Las Vegas!

8/1/08 - Summer wrap-up
Thanks again to all our participating sites!

We're finishing up our most successful local qualifying season ever! A huge thanks to all our sites that participated.

To our Club Pro's and TD's: We look forward to hosting many of you at our Club Pro National Finals and invitations are on their way to the automatic qualifiers at clubs that hosted 60 or more players, thereby guaranteeing them an invitation to this event.

To our players advancing to the Regional Finals: We wish you good luck in your quest to be our 2008 Champions and "America's Best 2 Some" in your respective division. We hope you will all enjoy your experience at the Regional Finals and we also look forward to hosting the winning teams (and ties) from the Regional's at the National Finals in Las Vegas.

For our participating facilities that hosted 24 or more players but less than 60, you still have at shot at attending this year's finals and qualifying for a $500 Pro Pool payment if one of your teams advances to the National Finals from our Regional Sites.

The "Wheel your 4 Some" option was a big plus for many of our sites that were successful this year and we will be announcing this as a standard (but still optional) feature of our event for next year. Look for our promotion of this as we prepare our collateral material and web-site for the 2009 ESPN National Golf Challenge.

4/17/08 - Wheel Your 4 Some Introduced
We'll be promoting this as an Optional Feature in 09!

Due to the very positive response to our initial testing of this optional feature we have decided to remove it from "test of concept" and make it immediately available to all Local Host Sites wishing to offer this Optional Feature during their event(s).

Our players should be advised that because this is strictly an option, not all of our Local Host Qualifying Sites may be prepared to include this feature in their event. If you are interested in bringing a foursome to participate, please contact the site, in advance, to determine their participation.

A more complete description of "Wheel Your 4 Some", now more appropriately called "Triple Play" in 2009, can be found at our special webpage.