Donald Trump strengthens foothold on tournament golf

The Herald Scotland

14 hours ago

Good luck with that. During the weekly trial of chiselling out these back page bletherations, for instance, your correspondent tends to approach the task in hand with about as much relish as a Cocker Spaniel that's being reluctantly ushered into the vet's clinic for a neutering procedure.
It's a dog's life, eh? 'It's more like a dog's bloomin' breakfast,' sneered the sports editor as he worked his way through these opening few paragraphs with his head buried in his hands as usual.
For the golf writers, the work goes on. This week, the DP World Tour returns to Scottish soil for the Nexo Championship, which is being held at, whisper it, Trump International Golf Links near Aberdeen.
A late addition to the circuit's schedule, the event was originally called the Scottish Championship before a title sponsor hopped on board.
In case you're wondering, Nexo is a premier digital assets wealth platform with its high heid yins proudly stating that, 'golf is a natural fit for our brand: elevated, global, and principled.' Is that not what Trump says about himself?
Anyway, the Nexo Championship is the second significant event to be staged on Trump's golfing turf in the space of a few days following the Staysure PGA Seniors' Championship, which concluded on Sunday.
The other week, a petition urging the R&A not to take The Open back to Trump's Turnberry course was launched and earned upwards of 50,000 signatures.
I've not found a petition against the staging of the Nexo Championship – the Scottish Government has chipped in with £180,000 of funding for it - or the golden oldies event on a Trump property yet.
Amid all the fist-shaking, harrumphing, placard-waving and handwringing that greeted the US President's visit to these shores last week, the actual golf events themselves clatter and batter on unhindered.
Slowly but surely, Trump continues to establish a foothold in the business of championships on this side of the pond.
My learned colleague, Ewan Murray of The Guardian, suggested in his own column recently that it would be no surprise to see a Scottish Open at Turnberry within the next few years.
As Trump cut the ribbon on his second course at Balmedie last week, Guy Kinnings, the chief executive of the European Tour Group, was part of the ceremonial party.
Presumably, any discussions about tournament golf at Trump-owned venues moved beyond the staging of the Nexo Championship?
We all, meanwhile, know the championship Trump desperately craves.
Despite all the 'dialogue' and 'feasibility work' about an Open at his treasured Turnberry, however, we all also know that there's probably more chance of the game's most celebrated major being held at Littlehill municipal while Trump is still around.
In his homeland of the USA, Trump had a major, the PGA Championship, booked in at his Bedminster course in 2022 until the PGA of America stripped him of the honour after his incitement of the Capitol insurrection.
PGA Championships are assigned to venues until 2032 while US Opens are already locked in at various courses until 2043. The R&A, meanwhile, has announced Open venues only through 2027.
Even if the prospect seems as remote as Point Nemo, The Open still remains Trump's best crack at a major championship. He may not be around to see it, mind you.
It's hard to think that 10 years have hurtled by since we all trotted off down to Turnberry for the Women's Open of 2015 and the bold Donald hijacked affairs by birling about over the Ailsa course in his helicopter before making a grand entrance.
That first morning of play was probably one of the most sigh-inducing days of my working life. Well, apart from the time there was no press lunch at an Amateur Championship one year.
The bizarre circus unfolded not long after Trump had made his outlandish comments about Mexicans as his Presidential campaign became more volatile and divisive.
Poor Lizette Salas, the daughter of Mexican immigrants who had spoken with quiet dignity on the eve of the championship about Trump's inflammatory rant, was encircled by cameras and microphones upon completing her opening round.
In an elbowing, barging scrum of news reporters, she faced barking, salivating questions like, 'is he a racist?' instead of the more genteel, 'what club did you hit into the seventh?'
It was all spectacularly unedifying on the first day of a women's major championship.
About a year earlier, Peter Dawson, the then chief executive of the R&A, suggested that, 'it would be ludicrous if something said on the Presidential campaign trail dictated where an Open is held.'
That observation didn't age particularly well, did it?
Amid the general pandemonium that engulfed the Women's showpiece that day, a teenage Lydia Ko adopted an air of shrugging nonchalance to the whole palaver.
'I was on the 16th and saw the helicopter and I was like, 'man, that's a really nice helicopter, I'd love one,' she said at the time.
Here in 2025, Trump's own heart's desire remains an Open Championship. For the time being, though, a Nexo Championship will do him.
It's a telling foot on the DP World Tour ladder. He may climb a few rungs yet.