Design Déjà vu – Organizers of the Asia Pacific Golf Summit make up yet another award to plug Nicklaus Design

In news that will hardly shock observers of the Asian golf industry, it was announced this week that organizers of the Asia Pacific Golf Summit will yet again honor Jack Nicklaus at their annual talkfest. This will be the fourth Summit in a row that has feted the Golden Bear, this time with the great man receiving the newly formed Global Legacy Award.

For those with short memories:

2009 – Jack Nicklaus presented with the Summit’s inaugural Lifetime Achievement Award.

2010 – Jack Nicklaus inducted into the inaugural class of the Asia Pacific Golf Hall of Fame.

2011 – Jack Nicklaus delivers an address to the delegates, but receives no awards.

2012 – Lingering resentment from 2011 snub rectified with the creation of a Global Legacy Award.

APGS organizers describe the Global Legacy Award as being bestowed upon Nicklaus and his company for the ‘pace-setting and pioneering work that has been carried out over the last four decades globally.’ Editorial president Spencer Robinson added that, ‘the award is timely given the fact that Nicklaus Design has some 95 golf courses in play or under construction in Asia.’

Apparently when he was presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award three years ago the company had ‘only’ built 80 odd courses in the region, way below the magical 95 figure clearly necessary for the establishment of a new Legacy Award.

As we pointed out last year on this site, organizers of the Summit talk of the need for reform and change in the region but continue to shamelessly spruik the same signature design firms who have contributed to the game’s current malaise. Nicklaus himself admitted recently that his company had to accept some responsibility for golf course development getting out of hand in recent times.

Despite this, CEO of the Asia Pacific Golf Group Mike Sebastian continues to cheerlead Nicklaus Design, boldly claiming that ‘new standards have been set and a whole global industry spawned’ under Nicklaus’s stewardship. Despite a lot of hot air from organizers, questioning those new standards and perhaps looking for better ways of building sustainable golf courses is clearly not on the APGS agenda.

And once again it’s left to independent media to point out that Nicklaus Design is a business partner of the Asia Pacific Golf Summit. Last year it was Tony Jacklin, celebrated at the Summit whilst Mike Sebastian was acting as his design representative in the South East Asian region.

Sebastian and his team continually pledge to grow golf and help reform poor business practices, but actions speak louder than words and thankfully the event’s influence appears to have waned in recent years.

Who knows, perhaps once the Summit has presented Nicklaus with its gratuitous Asia Pacific Excellence in Sport Award (not kidding, a real award!) and run out of glorified accolades to bestow upon the Golden Bear, they might actually settle down to talk about solutions for golf’s real problems. Problems that clearly don’t include how to honor professional golfers turned design businessman like Jack Nicklaus.

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