Following a successful and star-packed JCB Championship last year, 2011 Open champion Darren Clarke will return as host for the Legends Tour event in 2023.
The tournament, which is held at the JCB Golf and Country Club in Staffordshire, England, will take place between 3 and 5 August. Speaking about the opportunity to host the tournament for the second year in succession, Clarke, who won the Senior Open Championship last year, said: "I was extremely proud to host The JCB Championship last year for what was a truly fantastic event.
"The JCB Golf & Country Club is a great venue, and we had such a great field in 2022 with so many former Major champions and legends of the game taking part. I am really looking forward to returning in 2023 as host and am grateful to have been given this opportunity again.”
In 2022, Alex Cejka secured a two-shot win over 2014 Ryder Cup winning captain Paul McGinley in the tournament. Clarke almost crowned his role as host with victory, but eventually settled for a tie for third alongside South Africans Retief Goosen and eventual Order of Merit winner James Kingston. Other big-name players who participated included two-time Major winner John Daly, 1988 Masters champion Sandy Lyle and Spaniard Josie Maria Olazabal, who won the Green Jacket twice in the 1990s.
Chief Executive of the Tour Phil Harrison is delighted that the JCB Golf and Country Club will again host one of its tournaments.
He said: “We are thrilled to have secured yet another international event at the JCB Golf & Country Club. It is a truly world-class venue and this is a great opportunity to showcase the course once again. The 2023 Legends Tour season will be the biggest to date with plenty of new events at top-quality courses and shows our commitment to growing the Tour as a sporting spectacle.”
The course has quickly garnered acclaim since it opened in 2018 and players will find a mixture of wide and narrow fairways and complex greens as they aim to succeed Cejka as champion.
The season, which starts in May, will also feature a Donald Trump course for the Staysure PGA Seniors Championship. That follows three weeks after the JCB Championship at Trump International Golf Links in Scotland. Played across 17 countries, the final tournament of the season is the MCB Tour Championship Mauritius, which takes place in December.
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