The winner of the 2010 European Challenge Tour Rankings Alvaro Velasco was given the honour of striking the first shot of the 2013 season at the Gujarat Kensville Challenge in Kensville Golf and Country Club.
The rising Indian sun, tinted by some early morning haze, greeted the opening tee shot of a season which is sure to produce plenty of drama and many future stars of world golf.
Who will be this year’s Nicolas Colsaerts, Martin Kaymer or Justin Rose? Will former amateur stars Peter Uihlein, Byeong-hun An or Wallace Booth finally make the breakthrough to the big stage?
Will the likes of Rhys Davies, Nick Dougherty or Oliver Wilson make the climb back on to The European Tour where they have had such success in previous years?
And then of course, there are the young ones, the up and coming stars waiting in the wings to make their mark in the professional ranks.
Will it be Jack Senior, who made an immediate impact on the Challenge Tour with a big performance at the Kazakhstan Open last year?
Or maybe it will be the Dane that everybody is talking about – young Lucas Bjerregaard, who will be hoping to follow in the footsteps of three of his compatriots who graduated from the Challenge Tour in 2012 and are this year plying their trade on the big stage.
Whatever happens this season, it is sure to produce plenty of joy, some heartbreak, but above all, oodles of drama.
