Kendall keen for home track assault

All roads lead to Russley, but Bay of Plenty's No1 amateur Brad Kendall won't mind if he takes a wee detour via his Mt Maunganui home track this weekend.
Kendall, 19, will tee it up in the Grant Clements Memorial 72-hole strokeplay tournament, one of the leading four-round events on the national amateur calendar, which has attracted a bumper field befitting its premier status.
Aucklander Ryan Fox, the defending champion, heads the 88-strong field on his +3.9 handicap, but Kendall is keen to get amongst it as he builds towards April's week-long New Zealand amateur at Russley in Christchurch.
Kendall will defend his national strokeplay title on the mainland, this year juggling a job as an apprentice electrician with his golfing commitments.
He is just back from two weeks across the Tasman, where he was part of the New Zealand line-up playing in the Master of the Amateurs in Melbourne and the Lake Macquarie Amateur invitational in New South Wales.
He heads back across the Tasman with Tauranga's Fusion Golf Academy, staying and playing at the Victoria Institute of Sport in Melbourne, and will also tee it up in the Australian Amateur in March.
Kendall had some putting problems prior to Christmas but said his game under coach Jay Carter was slowly coming right.
"I was hitting it not too bad over in Australia and seem to have sorted a few things out." Kendall, who also won the Waikato Winter Strokeplay and Paraparaumu Open titles last year, has ditched his Yes putter and returned to an old Odyssey favourite.
He and Andrew Stewart (Omokoroa) will team up for Bay of Plenty at the Grant Clements this weekend, fighting for team as well as individual glory against 11 other district two-man teams.
He's had to quickly reacquaint himself with his home track in the past week.
"Believe it or not I had a round at the Mount last weekend which was my first there since June last year. I'm away so much and do all my practise at Tauranga, so I'm never there."
Tournament convenor Ray Horsfall said they'd had a particularly good response this year from South Island players.
Sixty of the 88-strong men's field were on scratch handicaps or better, although just five females had entered, with the tournament clashing with qualifying for the New Zealand Women's Open.
The tournament commences at 7.45am tomorrow, with groups in the final 18 holes on Sunday heading out at 12.30pm.
Grant Clements Memorial leading players:
+3.9 Ryan Fox (Royal Auckland), +3.8 Chan Young Chung (Shandon), +3.6 Daniel Pearce (Hastings), +3.3 Brad Kendall (Mt Maunganui), +3.1 Thomas Spearman-Burn (Miramar), +2.4 Fraser Wilkin (Auckland), +2.4 Brent McEwan (St Clair), +2.3 Tom Cardno (Gulf Harbour), +2.2 Liam Balneaves (Greenacres), +2.2 Brad Hayward (New Plymouth), +2.2 Tane Robson (Cambridge), +2.1 Peter Lee (Springfield), +1.8 Shaun Jones (Russley), +1.7 Andrew Stewart (Omokoroa), +1.6 Ben Taylor (Omokoroa), +1.5 Ryan Chisnall (Greenacres), +1.4 Compton Pikari (Te Awamutu), +1.4 Simon Brownlee (Gulf Harbour).
Females:
+1.6 Chantelle Cassidy (Tokoroa), +1.4 Jesse Hamilton (Maungakiekie), 0.7 Rebekah Brownlee (Gulf Harbour).