Spokane Seeks To Lure Senior Citizens Regular Tour Stop Possible If Seattle Can’t Locate Sponsor

It’s clear that organizers of the Pro Classic, while working hard to promote this year’s Labor Day golf event at MeadowWood, continue to focus beyond that and well into the future.

In town to promote the appearance of 20 Senior PGA Tour players, senior pro Ken Still said he foresees this evolving into a full Senior Tour stop within the next several years.

“By ‘96 or ‘97 - no later than ‘98 if things work the way they should,” said Still, a Tacoma resident and the event’s host pro when asked about a timetable for luring the Senior Tour to Spokane.

Still said that most players appear in 10 to 15 corporate events during the year, but that the Pro Classic “gets more verbal attention” than any other one-day outing.

Pros stop off in Spokane between tour events in Salt Lake and Seattle, but the Seattle tournament “is sitting out on a limb and the limb is starting to break,” Still said. “They don’t have a sponsor lined up for next year.”

The implication by Still is that Spokane might make a convenient replacement in case that event falters.

Nearly 5,000 fans turned out for the inaugural event last August.

Promoter Toby Steward said he expects twice that many this time, as the field is headlined by 1992 Senior Open champ Larry Laoretti, FHP Health Care Classic champ Bruce Devlin, and Robert Landers, the Texas dairy farmer whose unique journey to the Senior Tour has drawn national attention.

Also, the event has been expanded to include a youth clinic and a $10,000 shootout among the 20 pros. As it did last year, the event will include an 18-hole pro-am and a clinic by trickshot specialist and Senior Tour player Bob Brue.

“The draw, of course, is the pros,” Steward said. “We had 17 last year and we have 20 this time, with 15 returning (from last year’s field).”

Tickets are $10 - with children age 12 and younger admitted free with an adult - and are available at G&B Select-A-Seat and at area golf courses.

The tournament benefits Junior Achievement.

, DataTimes