Are you aware of the Golf 'scramble'? It's a team event where players count only the best shots made by all members (eg, they tee off their second shots from the place where the best drive landed) to compile their score. Although I was familiar with the format, I never played it during my two decades of golfing-until last weekend.

The Royal Nepal Golf Club (RNGC) organised the scramble to give both professionals and amateurs a chance to play together and have fun trying something new. Each team included an amateur with a low, middle and high handicap as well as a professional. I could see that the amateurs really enjoyed the experience of hitting second shots from lies where before they could only dream of playing and of seeing just how well shots can be struck.

Humble thanks to the RNGC executive committee for realising the need to develop golf in Nepal and special thanks to executive committee member Dorjee Sherpa for conceiving of and successfully conducting last weekend's event. Thank you also to the diehard golfers of the corporate world who sponsored teams-without them the event wouldn't have been a success.

I met Dorjee Sherpa a few days before the scramble and found him in high spirits and full of advice: "It's high time that the amateurs appreciate the golf lessons they receive from professionals and started to give something back to help the growth of pro golf in the country."

I know that the whole golfing fraternity supports Sherpa's sentiments to support and reinvigorate our professional golf.

For the scramble I was paired up with three seniors-Pradeep Rana, KB Shah and Vinode Rana-representing St Peters Hospital (England). They all enjoyed the format tremendously, as did the other participants I spoke to, most of whom were making their maiden appearances in the scramble. Undoubtedly the team of pro Deepak Thapa Magar and amateurs Niraj Rana, Kundan Rana and Arun Chanda were simply delighted with their victory.

Like other professional golfers in Nepal, I see this event as a boost to the local pro game. Everyone in the golfing community is aware that professionals need more of these 72-hole stroke-play events to improve their standards and an event like the scramble always adds an additional fun element to that serious task.

Deepak Acharya is a golf instructor and Golf Director atGokarna Forest
Golf Resort & Spa, Kathmandu. [email protected]