CELEBRITY SHOOTOUT TO CONCLUDE CLASSIC WEEK
PALM BEACH GARDENS, FL – An assortment of sports, entertainment and business celebrities will team with local amateur golfers in the Honda Classic Celebrity Shootout, a new Pro-Am that will be the final event of Honda Classic tournament week.
The Shootout will be held Monday March 3, 2008 on PGA National’s Champion Course, using the same pin placements that the pros use in Sunday’s final round of The Honda Classic.
Each foursome of amateurs will be paired with a celebrity for a 10 a.m. shotgun start. A Gala Pairings party to select the groupings will be held Sunday night. Packages are $1500 and $2250 per person.
“We are excited about the addition of a celebrity event to the The Honda Classic schedule,” Honda Classic Executive Director Kenneth R. Kennerly said. “It will be a great morning for the players who choose to participate in the shootout and it will also be nice to have some top names in the sports, entertainment and business worlds join us for Sunday’s final round of The Honda Classic. Our Wednesday Pro-Am has traditionally sold out, so we haven’t been able to include celebrities in our pro-ams in the past like some events do. The addition of the Monday Shootout allows us to do that.”
The Celebrity Shootout is presented by longtime local sports business consultant Rick Horrow and Horrow Sports Ventures and will benefit the Melanoma Research Foundation and the Nicklaus Children’s Health Care Foundation.
Horrow, who has been the architect of 103 deals worth more than $13 billion in sports and urban infrastructure projects and also is the Sports Business Analyst for CNN, Fox Sports, CNBC, Westwood One, and CBS SportsLine, will work together with The Honda Classic management team to line up celebrity participants who are expected to include current and former professional athletes, sports and business executives, and members of the entertainment industry.
This is the first event of its kind where a major pro-am is being held after the PGA TOUR tournament rather than before the event.
CELEBRITY SHOOTOUT – 2
“We are hoping to make this the definitive charity event in South Florida,” said Horrow, whose father died of skin cancer when he was 11. “This will be a unique opportunity to use an existing major sports property in the West Palm Beach area and begin a tradition of attracting big names in sports and entertainment for a fun event in the South Florida wintertime that is a dynamic extension of the existing tour event.”
The $1,500 package for The Honda Classic Celebrity Shootout include tickets to the full week of activities of the PGA tournament, including four Bear Trap credentials, four grounds passes, and two preferred parking passes. The upgraded $2250 package adds two Sunday Champions Club credentials and a room Sunday night at PGA National Resort & Spa.
Call Joanie Connors, the Honda Classic’s Director of Sales, for more information at 561-799-4619.
The Honda Classic, Palm Beach County’s largest sporting event, awarded more than $505,000 to area children’s charities in 2007, allowing the tournament to surpass the $14 million mark in charitable contributions during American Honda’s 26-year tenure as title sponsor.
The 2008 Honda Classic will be played February 25-March 2.