Behind the scenes at Genesis Scottish Open – what it
up world-class event
Golf correspondent Martin Dempster talks to some of key people involved in Rolex Series event
Worth $9 million and featuring a world-class field, the Scottish Open is one of the biggest events on the Scottish sporting calendar.
It occupies one of the prime spots on the global golf schedule, having been held the week prior to The Open since 1987, with its status being further elevated after becoming co-sanctioned by the DP World Tour and PGA Tour in 2022.
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American Xander Schauffele, the 2023 winner and now the PGA champion, is among the star names teeing up in this year’s Genesis Scottish Open at The Renaissance Club in East Lothian.
As both McIlroy and Schauffele prepare to compete in this year’s Rolex Series event along with the likes of Max Homa, Jordan Spieth, Justin Thomas, Hideki Matsuyama, Viktor Hovland, Ludivig Aberg, Matthew Fitzpatrick and, of course, home hero we talk to those involved in a partnership that tees up a special week on Scotland’s Golf Coast.
As Championship Director – this is my seventh year in the role and, as a Scotsman, I take great pride in being heavily involved in the Genesis Scottish Open and helping to grow it and really make it one of the premium sporting events in Scotland – I carry overall responsibility for the event from the DP World Tour’s perspective. That means ensuring that the event is safely staged to the requirements of the partners, the players, the fans and any stakeholder who is attending the event. We have a responsibility to provide the facilities and experience that is right for them. It’s my job to drive the event forward and I am very much focused on trying to grow the event, aligning with the goals of Genesis and our other key partners, including VisitScotland and Rolex.
As a proud Scot, Rory Colville feels honoured to be the Genesis Scottish Open Championship Director for the FP World Tour. Picture: Andrew Redington/Getty Images.
We’ve got a team of ten in the Championship Management team who have been on site at various stages for the last ten weeks overseeing the infrastructure build. We have colleagues covering marketing, commercial aspects, communications, content, ticketing, sustainability and Miguel’s team of referees which creates a broader event team of around 40 staff. All feed into the event working towards a successful week.
It’s such a global and significant event for ourselves and the PGA Tour, so it’s an event that requires a lot of staff to be in attendance. That means there’s a much wider pool of staff on site during the event itself. It’s definitely a week when a lot of the people in my team are working over 14-hour days. We are first in the door, so to speak, and last out. You want to be there to make sure that when the first player or first fan arrives, everything is working and up and running.
We are making some significant changes this year to the spectator experience as we are determined to grow the event through the fans. We’re actually changing the Spectator Village to a Fan Zone and the main enhancement for this year comes thanks to an introduction made to us at last year’s event by Visit Scotland. We’ve announced a collaboration with Fringe by the Sea, the successful music and entertainment festival held in August every year in North Berwick. Fringe by the Tee will host Scottish musical talent and entertainment in our fan zone, including music from Edith Bowman and entertainment from Fred MacAulay. It should have something for all the family and is a really exciting direction for the event.
One other thing I’d say about the fan experience is that we are also creating a stadium on the sixth, so that will be a fully surrounded fan experience on the par-3 sixth hole with a host providing entertainment. An exciting development as we build the place to go on the course.
John Sarvadi has taken over as CEO of The Renaissance Club, where the Genesis Scottish Open is being held for the sixth year in a row, from his brother Jerry. Picture: The Renaissance Club
The weather plays a big part, of course it does. If you look at the last couple of years since Genesis became involved, we had glorious sunshine year one with them then last year we had to finish early on both the Saturday and Sunday. But last year we had such an exciting finish, arguably the best finish we’ve ever had and that was it despite being interrupted by the weather. I have to admit I’ve not paid too much attention to the weather forecast yet, but I will start looking soo
We are very, very grateful for all the support that the Sarvadi family – Jerry, John and Paul – who own The Renaissance Club provide. We were determined to find a home for the event to help it grow and a home nearer a big market like Edinburgh and the Sarvadis have been very important in that respect as they have helped us whether it be investing on off-course infrastructure that helps the event logistically or investing in golf course changes and progression.
Miguel Vidaor is the Genesis Scottish Open Tournament Director for the DP World Tour, having taken over the role from Mike Stewart last year. Picture: David Cannon/Getty Images.
Genesis was launched in 2015, so the brand is not yet ten years old and from the very beginning golf has been a significant component of our marketing and communications strategy and we really sum this up as an audacious commitment to golf, which has over time manifested itself with the Genesis Championship in Korea, the Genesis Invitational at Riviera Country Club in Los Angeles and, most recently, the Genesis Scottish Open at The Renaissance Club, as well as the Presidents Cup and, as was just announced, TGL, which is the new ‘prime time’ golf league in the US, which is being backed by Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy. So golf is a fundamental lynchpin of the Genesis brand and how we communicate.
The Genesis Scottish Open title sponsorship came about as conversations were taking place between the PGA Tour and DP World Tour and since 2022 I think it’s been a fantastic event for Genesis. The calibre of the winners for starters in Xander Schauffele in 2022 then Rory McIlroy in 2023, the current world No 3 and world No 2 respectively. For us, we see this as an opportunity to present our brand to a global audience, particularly with a focus on the UK and Europe, introducing people to our key attributes of design, technology and, more important, hospitality. That’s the distinctly Korean element that we believe is part of our Genesis ownership experience, so we bring that to life at the golf and, fundamentally, that involves looking after everyone who attends and participates in the tournament. That starts with the players, the caddies, their families. It also starts with the fans who are on site and also those who are engaging with the tournament off site and it also includes our guests from around the world who we host.
This year’s event is going to be magic, to use that well-known Scottish expression, and, of course, with The Open at Royal Troon, it’s going to be two mega weeks of golf here in Scotland. We are very conscious that the Genesis Scottish Open has that nice relationship and dynamic with The Open and the players enjoy being over here a week early and playing links golf and getting ready. The Renaissance Club and the atmosphere around the event is all conducive to a really nice peak before a major and, of course, the final major of the year.
Scot Graeme Russell, a keen golfer who plays at Prestwick, is the Genesis Brand Advisor
I will get there on Saturday around midday. We have an advance referee, Mats Lanner, who arrived Wednesday of the week before while PGA Tour Tournament Director Stephen Cox arrived on Monday. They will be in charge of marking the golf course and getting everything ready for the arrival of the rest of the Rules team.Basically, my responsibility is anything inside the ropes, that’s how we describe it. Rory Colville will be dealing with the commercial side, the sponsors, the infrastructure etc – whereas I deal with course preparation and the competition itself and also making sure the player facilities are as they should be. By that, I mean transport, catering, medical facilities, gym – all that sort of thing.During the week, we’ll assess the golf course, we’ll mark it, we’ll prepare the local rules and also a course evacuation plan and then obviously we need to plan the course set up for the week. The PGA Tour sets up the front nine and they will have referees doing that and Mats Lanner will be doing the back nine.I inherited the Genesis Scottish Open from Mike Stewart last year and it is a great honour for me to be part of such a huge event. It changes from year to year, very much depending on weather conditions and we are obviously talking about Scotland and links golf and that has a huge impact on how we set up the golf course. It obviously depends on whether it is playing bouncy, fast and firm or whether we have a lot of rain in the forecast or a lot of wind.
Remember last year when we had the crazy weekend with the unusual storms on Saturday afternoon and the super strong winds on Sunday. We will have our weather people on site from the Sunday prior and they will be able to give us a very good outlook of how the weather looks even though it is very changeable in Scotland, but we can create a good plan based on the forecast.