Golfing Union of Ireland
 |
|
| Sport | Amateur Golf |
|---|---|
| Abbreviation | GUI |
| Founded | 1891 |
| Affiliation | The R&A |
| Location | Carton House, Maynooth |
| President | G I McCandless(Ulster) |
| (founded) | 1891 |
| Official website | |
| www |
|
The Golfing Union of Ireland (GUI) is the governing body for men's and boy's amateur golf in Ireland. It represents over 430 golf clubs with over 170,000 members and has strong relations with The R&A, which is the global governing body of golf outside the United States and Mexico.
The GUI was established in 1891 and was the first national golfing union to be established anywhere in the world. The GUI organises the Irish Amateur Open Championship, founded in 1892.
It is suggested that the origins of the Union lie in the desire by a number of golf clubs to create an Irish Championship. There were 28 clubs already established in Ireland before the foundation of the Union, although they were known as 'greens' at that time. The Union was established at a meeting in Belfast on 13 November 1891, which was attended by representatives of nine clubs, all of which were located in the province of Ulster. The founding clubs were The County Down, The County Club at Portrush, Royal Belfast, Killymoon, Dungannon, Aughnacloy, Ballycastle, Portsalon and Buncrana. Once a properly constituted organisation had been established to administer the game, golf in Ireland became more popular, evidenced by the fact that a further 97 clubs were formed between 1892 and 1900.
The Union introduced a handicapping system in 1897 and this was thought to be the most far-reaching advance in the promotion of the game. At that time, individual clubs implemented their own systems, based on the scores of their most consistent player; using him as a back-marker and allocating other players shots accordingly. The Union adopted a similar approach in developing the first universal handicapping system, and used one Thomas Gilroy as the back-marker. Gilroy was born in Dundee in 1852 and was to be seen knocking balls around Carnoustie with a cleek at the age of seven. He was educated at St. Andrews where he received tuition from both Old and Young Tom Morris. He moved to Ireland in 1885 and was by far the most consistent player there over the next ten years, holding the course record for most of the courses in existence in the country at that time.
...
Wikipedia