North Berwick pair set to take on UK's best PGA pros

Two PGA pros will fly the flag for North Berwick Golf Club when they compete in the Titleist & FootJoy PGA Professional Championship next week.

Head pro Martyn Huish and coach Paul Wardell are among the Scots in action in the £91,500 championship which takes place at Burnham & Berrow in Somerset from June 2-5.

The pair secured their final spots at Blairgowrie where Carluke’s Craig Ronald topped the qualifiers.

North Berwick, winner of the TGI Pro Shop of the Year award this year, has a rich connection to The PGA’s flagship event with Huish’s dad, David, a past two-time winner of the 72-hole tournament.

Wardell, who was given his first job in golf by Huish senior at North Berwick, has been back at the links since December and is looking forward to the challenge of taking on the UK’s leading PGA pros especially since it is being contested on a links course.

“I prefer links golf, it’s real golf where you get the chance to be creative and use your imagination and adapt to the conditions rather than the regimental tee to green style of golf,” he said.

“A lot of players say they don’t like playing in the wind but I can get it round in the wind so don’t mind it.”

Wardell has won more than 20 times on the Tartan Tour and was runner up to Paul Lawrie in the Scottish PGA Matchplay Championship in the early 2000s.

But coaching is very much his focus now, from Clubgolf initiatives through to more elite level players, where he’s able to plough some of those playing experiences into his coaching including with the Lothian boys development squads.

“When you’ve played golf under pressure you understand why people take on certain shots and I can pass on experience from competing and being in certain situations,” he says.

Wardell is equally dedicated to nurturing beginners too where he encourages them to use their imaginations.

“We don’t just work on pure technique, they need to work on creativity, feel and imagination too.”

It’s a philosophy that has brought Wardell considerable success down the years and he will be hoping it can again in Somerset where in addition to a £10,000 first prize is up for grabs, six places for the Great Britain & Ireland PGA Cup team to face the United States in California in September will be decided. The winner also gets use of a Peugeot 308GT for a year.

Other Scottish qualifiers in action at Burnham & Berrow will be Alan Stuart (Paul Lawrie Golf Centre), Mark Loftus ( MearnsCastleGolfAcademy), Ian Taylor (Drumpellier), Craig Everett (Caldwell), Jonathan Cliff (Murrayfield), Graeme Brown (Montrose), and Patrick Walker (BallumbieCastle).