No trouble in Paradise

By Lethbridge Herald on June 26, 2025.

Al Beeber
Lethbridge Herald

The best mens amateur golfers in Alberta teed up early Wednesday morning on the first of three days of the Alberta Mens Amateur Championship at Paradise Canyon Country Club.

When the event was last staged here in 1993, Paradise Canyon was also the host course.

Golfers from the north, central and south zones of Alberta have converged on Lethbridge for the 113th event with players including Andy Graziano, the 2024 mens club champion at Paradise, who earned an exemption into the tournament.

The public is welcome to watch the golfers during the tournament with no charge to follow them along the course in the river valley.

The tournament kicked off under sunny skies. With a mix of sun and cloud and highs of 24 today and Friday, golfers and spectators alike  will have good conditions for playing and watching.

According to Alberta Golf’s website and Paradise Canyon owner Ron Sakamoto, the tournament is a springboard to launch the career of many  players, some of whom have, and will go on to, professional careers.

“This is the top amateur golf tournament in Alberta and a lot of them go on to be pros,” said Sakamoto in the clubhouse shortly after the first group hit the course.

The tournament is not only important for Paradise Canyon, said Sakamoto, but the entire city.

“This is bringing in hundreds of people staying at hotels, eating at restaurants,” he said. “We’re so pleased to put Lethbridge on the map.”

Sakamoto noted, that other tournaments hosted at Paradise Canyon each year raise more  than $1 million for local charities.

Winner of the tournament is named to the Morse Cup inter-provincial  team for 2026 and will compete in the Pacific Coast Amateur  championship.

And says albertagolf.org, “this will also be the first event with an  inter-provincial team being named, with the top three finishers with Alberta residence making up the 2025 Willingdon Cup Team to compete at  the Canadian Men’s Amateur Championship.”

In a statement to media, Paradise Canyon’s head golf professional Jae Maegaard said that Kelly Thorsen and the turf maintenance staff “have done an incredible job preparing our golf course for the highest competition in Alberta.”

According to Sakamoto the sand golfers will be seeing and trying to avoid this week is the same sand used at Pebble Beach Golf Links in California which annually hosts PGA events.

PGA of Canada executive professional Matt Markway says the Alberta Amateur has north, central and south qualifiers with the best players making the cut for the championship.

“It’s the best of the best in Alberta,” said Barkway.

The three-day event is one of two Alberta golf tournaments being staged at Paradise Canyon this week. After the mens amateur ends, the  Alberta golf tour hits the course on Saturday and Sunday. The event is  one of only three two-day majors being staged by the tour aside from the championship in August.

Lethbridge, said Barkway, was lucky enough to land one of the majors this year.

“It’s still a competitive event” but a little more casual with golfers using carts instead of walking the course like participants in the  Amateur do, said Barkway.

“Hopefully that tour continues to grow,” he added.

Created in 2012 when a group of golfers saw a need for a friendly competitive golf series, the tour has expanded from three events in  its first year to 16 tournaments. It is staged at what the tour calls  golfers’ favourite courses and “hidden gems.”

Calling itself as the beer league hockey of golf, the tour states  events are for those players with the elite days of golf behind them,  or perhaps yet in the future.

In addition to Alberta stops in locations including Olds, Rockyview, Ponoka, Calgary and Edmonton, the tour has tournaments in three B.C. locations – the first being Invermere where the tour opened in May. It wraps up Aug. 21-24 in Cranbrook and Kimberly.