NEW DELHI – Dec. 6, 2004 –Ashok Mankad and Pargat Singh, two of India’s greatest sportspersons, may have fashioned many an Indian victories in cricket and hockey respectively. However, playing a different game, they led their teams to victory on Day-1 and Day-2 respectively in the Vipul Corporate Invitational Golf tournament at the Classic Golf Resort, in Gurgaon near here on Saturday.
While it was `Huryana Hurricane’ Kapil Dev and `Master Blaster’Virendra Sehwag who stole the limelight on the opening day, it was the turn of Olympic silver medallist Major Rajyavardhan Rathore and former Olympian and penalty corner specialist Pargat Singh who joined in the cricketers on the concluding day of the two-day invitational event.
Ashok Mankad led his team of leading amateur Gagan Verma, Anu Manglani and Ankur Sachdeva with the quartet logging 126 points. The team of former India of spinner Nikhil Chopra, Daman Siegal, Amit Luthra and Raj Adhlakha finished second with six points behind.
On day-two, Pargat Singh, Vinod Rao, Manoj Adlakha and Ravi Sannon aggregated 117 points to emerge victorious over the second-placed team of Kapil Dev, Col. Fazrul Rehman, Amar Raj Singh and Romi Malhotra by just two points.
It had to be Kapil Dev who bagged the cricketers prize with 39 points while former India wicket-keeper Syed Kirmani emerged as the runner-up.
The sportspersons who played the inaugural Vipul Corporate Invitational Golf Tournament felt honored to be a part of an event which not only gave them an opportunity to interact among themselves but also meet and mingle amongst the corporate czars. “I for one try every sport but golf is another sport that I am attracted to,” said Maj. Rathore. “Both games though totally different in nature, have one thing in common – concentration. Golf is more of a relaxant to me,” said the ace shooter.
While the Indian stars sweated it out on the course, celebrated television hostess Mandira Bedi and Amanpreet Wahi who anchors the Indian Golf Show along with the city’s top models were a part of the golf clinic-cum-putting competition that was held as a part of the tournament. Mandira won the tournament while Raavi More, wife of National selection committee chairman Kiran More and Poonam came joint-second.
In the skills competition, Keshav Mishra who drove to 324 yards won the `Line and Length’ prize, while Ricky Lal putted to two inches to win the `Blind-folded Monster Putt’. Ashok Mehra was victorious in the Sand Play competition.
The two-day event was played on an Individual Stableford format while the celebrities who played on both the days took part in an eclectic format, which counted their scores over two rounds. The event was managed by Tiger Sports Marketing which also has the marketing and managing rights of the Indian PGAI Tour and the IGU National Amateur Junior/Sub-Junior Tour.
