Headline: The Haven Country Club Is Ready to Host the 34th Massachusetts Father & Daughter Championship on August 11

For Immediate Release: August 10, 2016

Past champions Bill & Katie Nelson (below) and Phil & Molly Smith (bottom) will compete at the 34th MGA Father & Daughter Championship at The Haven CC.

Norton, MA — The MGA Championship schedule continues on August 11 with the 34th playing of the Massachusetts Father Daughter Championship, to be held in Boylston at The Haven Country Club, an 18-hole William Mitchell course that also plays host to the New England PGA Pro-Pro Championship, an event the course has held every year since 1976.

For the sixth straight year, the Championship will feature two divisions.

In 2011, the MGA introduced a junior and senior division to the Father Daughter Championship to incorporate a wider field of competitors and in 2014, those divisions were reworked to include a Championship division and a Forward division, which are decided on by the set of tees that each team will play from.

The two divisions are differentiated solely by course yardage, as the daughters in the Championship division will play from the gold tees (approx. 5,800 yds.) while the daughters in the Forward division will play from the red tees (approx. 5,200 yds.). Regardless of division, all fathers will play from the white tees with an approximate yardage of 6,400 yards.

On Thursday, those two fields will welcome a combined 44 Father/Daughter pairs to the links as each team will play 18-holes of stroke play with a modified foursome format. The Championship division will tee off beginning at 8 am with the Forward division beginning their rounds at 10:30 am.

“We are very excited to be hosting the 2016 Father Daughter Championship at The Haven Country Club,” said Shawn Bennett, the MGA's manager of championships & member services . “We have a large contingent of competitors in both divisions and we look forward to see how each fairs in this Championship Proper.”

THCC Owner and President, Regan Remillard, echoed that sentiment.

“The Haven Country Club is honored to host the MGA's 2016 Father-Daughter Championship," said Remillard. "We're delighted to be the host venue for a championship that focuses on family and where so many father-daughter competitors will create memories that will last a lifetime.”

Among the notables competing in the eighth of 12 MGA Championship events will be father/daughter duo of Bill and Katie Nelson (Blackstone GC), who won the Championship division after shooting an even par 72 at LeBaron Hills Country Club last July. The father/daughter duo of Philip Smith (Longmeadow GC) and Molly Smith (Mount Pleasant GC) will look to recapture a title they won two years ago in the Forward division when they tee off at 11:20 a.m.

The Haven Country Club, which has also previously hosted both Men and Women’s Massachusetts Open’s, was formerly known as Mount Pleasant Country Club until 2014, when the club was renamed following the transition from a member-owned club to being owned and operated by a professional management team. The decision to rename the club from Mount Pleasant Country Club was in part to distinguish it from two other Massachusetts courses that have similar names. Other changes at the club, including improvements to the clubhouse and course, have also been made in recent years.

Entries for the MGA Father Daughter Championship are open to any amateur Father and Daughter team who both hold a membership at an MGA member club.

For complete coverage of the event, make sure to check the MGA’s website, www.mgalinks.org and follow us on social media (@mgalinks) and #MassFD.