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TSN Senior Reporter

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AURORA, ONT. – All in all, it’s been a pretty good couple of weeks for the folks at Golf Canada.

Last week, the governing body of golf in this country received official news of a date shift of the RBC Canadian Open, going from the horrid spot after the Open Championship to a better one just before the U.S. Open.

Then late last week, it announced that the much-loved Merry Mex, Lee Trevino, would return to Glen Abbey to help celebrate the national championship. Trevino was the first winner at the Abbey back in 1977, one of three Canadian Open titles he collected.

And on Monday, Golf Canada confirmed that CP has signed on as title sponsor of the Canadian Women’s Open for five more years, taking it through 2023 with next year’s tournament slated for Magna Golf Club, north of Toronto.

The new arrangement came together quickly with CP signing on a week ago after a short negotiation and the confirmation of Magna GC happening just a few days ago.

“It took us a while to get there but once we got there the last five weeks have been really phenomenal, just closing up the agreement as well as working with the golf club,” said Laurence Applebaum, Golf Canada’s CEO.

Applebaum, who has been on the job just over a year, has been striving to solidify the tournament situation with the organization’s marquee events, which provides a stronger base from which to operate.

It makes it much easier to find suitable host courses for events and to better plan for the operational side of things. Perhaps the only downside is that both men’s and women’s sponsorship agreements end in the same year, meaning some trouble if both failed to extend beyond 2023.

However, that issue was small compared to the benefits, Applebaum said.

“One of the things when I arrived was that most of our contracts were on the shorter side and for us now, we have a six-year agreement with RBC as a title sponsor. We have a five-year agreement with CP. We’re about to announce a few other premier partnerships. It’s important to stagger them, absolutely but our two biggest events are secure and the financial stability of the organization is also secure.”

Applebaum confirmed that the 2020 CP Women’s Open will be held in western Canada, likely in the Vancouver area although a site hasn’t been confirmed.

Keith Creel, the president and chief executive officer of CP, said that the sponsorship extension was an easy decision to make for his company.

“There’s nothing I’ve ever done personally or professionally that connects across so many different areas, whether it’s business or the people in the community, like golf does in Canada. It makes great business sense, it makes great people sense.”

This year’s event is scheduled for the Wascana G&CC in Regina, Aug. 23-26.

Before that, however, the RBC Canadian Open will be held at Glen Abbey for what is quite possibly the final time.

The course is in a protracted battle to be developed by its owner, ClubLink, while local groups try to prevent that from happening. Regardless, the course is not slated to host any more championships. The 2019 edition will be held at the Hamilton G&CC.

For Applebaum, the landscape for golf in Canada is looking bright and on solid ground, especially after the run of good news over the last few weeks.

“It would be my pleasure to do this on a weekly basis although I’m not sure I could keep up the energy,” he chuckled. “These last two weeks, with these big announcements, on the heels of the player field we are getting for the [men’s] Open with Dustin Johnson, Brooks Koepka, Tommy Fleetwood, Bubba Watson, Tony Finau and then Adam [Hadwin] coming into form – I would love to be at Glen Abbey this summer and have a Canadian really take a run – has been really satisfying for our team.”