If you are an ambitious and career-minded greenkeeper, you are offered a fantastic opportunity to strengthen your professional skills in competition with the country’s best greenkeeper students to win the title of Denmark’s ‘TourTurf® Student of the Year’ and a four-week sponsored internship at one of the world’s most recognised golf facility The Belfry in England.

The winner of the final will be named ‘TourTurf® Student of the Year’ and will win the TourTurf® Scholarship. This consists of a three-week stay and work at The Belfry golf course in England. Here you will join the greenkeeping team and gain invaluable knowledge and experience in the operation and care of one of the world’s best and most recognised golf courses - knowledge and experience that you can use to accelerate your own career.

In addition, you will also spend a few days at TourTurf®’s Development Centre in the UK reviewing product trials, and a few days at Lagan Valley Scientific conducting laboratory experiments.

All costs associated with the scholarship - excluding labour costs - will be covered by the sponsor TourTurf®. All finalists will receive logo clothing as a gift on the final day and are offered one year’s free membership of the DGA.

How to participate
Applications are welcome from greenkeepers who:

• Are in the last two years of education and have completed at least the 3rd main course of the education and will take the apprenticeship exam in this year or the next two.
• Or have completed the programme in the past year.

You can be nominated for the award by your educational institution and/or your workplace. You can also nominate yourself. Candidates for the award will be assessed based on their individual skills and competences, not their job title. All candidates have an equal chance of success based on these prerequisites:

• You must be a greenkeeper trainee or recent graduate in the past year.
• You must be employed and residing in Denmark.
• Your employer agrees to allow you to participate and to give you time off from your daily work for four weeks for the internship if you win. The committee will not compensate your employer for salary costs etc. during your stay.
• The attached nomination forms must be used.
• The deadline for participation in the competition is the 1st of June.

The nomination must be sent to the Danish Greenkeeper Association.
The stay takes place in October-November weeks 42-45.

Selecting the Winner

• A panel will deliver the prize of ”TourTurf® Student of the Year”.
  The judges will compose of a representative from DGA and DGU, along wih a golfmanager and a headgreenkeeper.
• From all nominations that fulfill the criterias, the panel will select up to 5 candidates to participate in a final. Candidates will receive message on latest 1st August.
• The winner is decided by an individual interview round lasting around 30 minutes. The format of the interview is up to interpretation, but topics will focus on your achievements in your career so far, your personal career ambitions, your professional abilities and how you expect the prize to help you towards your career ambitions. The final verdict will be based on your application, nomination and the final interview.

ARE YOU BRITISH MASTERS MATERIAL?

Angus Macleod is the Director of Golf Courses & Estates at The Belfry, an award winning hotel, resort and golf course in the heart of England. An avid dog enjoyer and an expert in his field, he shares some thoughts behind running the esteemed golf course at The Belfry.

"So the challenge we have is producing Ryder cup conditions every single day for our regular players and our corporate clients. …because if regular players play this golf course, to tournament conditions, then we’re going to be here all day. So we have to balance that, to give that effect, where they still feel that they’re walking in the footsteps of champions.

The challenge we have as greenkeepers is to make sure that every single green is performing the same. So if we start on the first and it’s 11.6 then every other single green on the golf course has to be 11.6. Now, how do we do that? So we mop mow the greens, So we have a stimp point, so we measure the greens in the morning before we cut to get a measurement.

We have got a lot of birdlife and a lot of wildlife on the golf courses, so this is their playground. We don’t want to disturb them, so we kind of work in harmony with nature. We’ve also introduced a lot of wildflower areas. You know, the UK has lost 97% of wildflower areas. So, it’s part of our responsibility to create natural and even unnatural habitats for the wildlife on the golf course.

The greenkeeping team for the estates is 42, and we do get upwards of maybe an extra twenty volunteers from local golf clubs and international interest as well - we’ve got a team from Cyprus, a team from Sweden, a team from Denmark, so there is a lot of international interest in being able to experience what it takes to run a British Masters.

Really, if you have a dog in your C.V., you have a job with me - it’s as simple as that. We have a number of dogs on the estates team, I think five currently - all extremely well behaved. So the garden team have got a dog and the office team have a dog, and so in all the departments, there’s dog representation. So from small little Terriers to Labradors. It’s fun, it’s take your dog to work day, every day at the Belfry."