Golf Tournament

A great warm-weather fundraising event is a golf fundraiser. This is a great way to get sponsorship from large corporations as well as participants. Golf is a huge hobby and it is a great way to get out of the office for the day.

Location-A good golf course and the service their tournament staff provides your event is a huge factor in your tournament’s success. Talk to local golf courses and see if they would offer discounted green fees for a certain amount of people. The ticket prices should include the green fee plus little extra.

When- Charity golf tournaments are traditionally on Mondays because most tournaments used to be held on private country club courses only available on Mondays. Mondays are still the first days that are booked, but you’ll get lower prices on a Tuesday or Wednesday. Some advice about Fridays: Fridays are the best day to get golfers to take a day off from work, but they are the worst days to get them to stick around for an awards dinner banquet. Here’s the trick. Have a Friday morning tournament with a luncheon (rather than dinner). Your golfers get to play hooky from work and still be home with his family by dinnertime. Some golf courses begin their higher weekend rates on Friday, but again, you’ll get a price break if you don’t lock up their whole day. I do not recommend weekend tournaments if you’re price sensitive -- you have much less leverage in negotiating with the golf course on their busiest days. In regards to what time of day, the best suggestion is to do a shot gun start. This way everyone is starting at once and end at the same time. This allows to hold a awards event at the end for a little more revenue.

Hole sponsors-Contact local businesses and ask them to sponsor a hole. To attract eighteen sponsors, make it affordable, say $100 or so. Show them a mockup of the signs that will be placed for each sponsor and your event program where you'll list all your sponsors.

Corporate sponsors-For the biggest financial impact, approach large corporations and ask them to sponsor your event. Companies with headquarters or substantial operations in your area are your best bets. Put together Sponsor Packages and be specific as to what's in it for the corporation, i.e. prominent signage at the event, corporate logo golf balls for all golfers, newspaper coverage, golfing slots for top executives, etc.

Silent auction-Solicit items from local businesses and even offer to pay for some popular items that will attract serious bidding such as golf lessons from the club pro or a set of new irons. On the day of your golf fundraiser, setup a couple of tables full of donated goods and services. Tape bidding sheets and descriptions of each item to the tables so that golfers can place bids one-handed.

Hold a raffle-You can sell raffle tickets for quality prizes in conjunction with your event. They don't even have to be golf related, but it does help to have at least some prizes such as a new golf bag, free round, season pass to top course, etc. To increase sales, sell tickets to the general public and not just to your group of supporters. You can even set up a sales table at high-traffic locations like shopping centers. obviously, follow all local regulations concerning raffle ticket sales.

Cash bar cart-Load up the back of a golf cart with ice and cold drinks, then drive the course and sell your golfers what they want. Cold beer and sodas are the best sellers, but don't forget to include snack foods like pretzels and chips.

Catered lunch-Work with the club to offer a catered lunch to all your golfers or at least a boxed lunch of sandwich, chips, and a cookie. Depending on what you're offering, markup your costs by $2 to $4 per person and you'll do well. overcharging will actually cut into your total profits.

Award Dinner/Ceremony-At the end of the tournament it will be nice to thank everyone & award the winning team with a prize. Work with the golf club to arrange something that could be large to small. This will be the time of the day when you announce the auction and raffle winners. Depending the charity, it wouldn't be a bad idea to have a speaker or someone from the charitable organization there to say a few words.

Two-handled tennis racquet developed

The racquet has two handles positioned at a right-angle to the head, allowing players to play two-handed open-stance forehand shots from both sides.

Its use is being permitted but it has raised eyebrows in the traditional sport.

Two American brothers, Dann and Brian Battistone, play with the innovative creations in competition.

One of them uses a volleyball-style jump serve, switching the racket from hand to hand mid-leap.

However, the racquet brothers take an International Tennis Federation (ITF) certificate to every game they play, proving that the racket, named ‘The Natural,’ is match-legal.

"We knew some people would be against the racket," said Brian, 29, from Las Vegas. "There’s a lot of tradition in tennis so this is quite radical."

The designer of the racket, Lionel Burt, said that it had been easy to convince the ITF to approve the racket: "Their basic position is, ‘If you can beat Roger Federer with a snow shovel of that dimension, go ahead and do it."

The double-hitter has already brought the brothers success. They had previously languished in the 800s in the world rankings and Brian had left tennis in 2000 to serve a mission for his Mormon faith. They have now risen to 206th and 207th in the doubles rankings using the racket, even beating world doubles number 11 pair Lukas Dlouhy and partner Tomas Zib.

Burt says that the racket took him 18 years to develop, and was inspired by his permanent back problems caused by always playing on one side. However, it is not the first time a racket of this type has been used and there are rumours linking ‘The Natural’ to a racket designed by a Florida-based mechanical engineer and over-50s player called Elie Boukheir.

Around five years ago, the ‘Logix’ racket was also developed, a two-handled racket where the second handle was used as a counterweight. The head was tilted at a 20 degree angle to the handle, supposedly allowing the player to hit a topspin shot by moving the racket parallel to the ground.

The most famous tilted-head rackets were designed by tennis company Snauwaert in the 1980s and were endorsed by former Wimbledon champion John McEnroe, a byword for tennis controversy. The Snauwaert rackets never caught on, but Burt says that now they have the financial backing and the players to make it happen.

Mike Tyson