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Thanks to the Astros’ Golf Foundation, Houston is becoming the next great golf city.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Jordan Bank\/Getty Images<\/p>\n
Memorial Park Golf Course is adding a pond to the 18th hole just to keep an LPGA Tour tradition alive.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Leah Vann\/Chron<\/p>\n
When the Houston Open was in danger of disappearing, Houston Astros\u00a0owner Jim Crane came to its rescue.<\/a><\/p>\n The tournament, started in 1949, lost its 26-year partnership deal with Shell after the 2017 tournament, forcing the Houston Golf Association to pay for it with limited cash reserves in 2018. The spring tournament even moved to the second week of October as a result.\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n Crane and Chevron stepped in, guaranteeing the\u00a0Houston Open<\/a>‘s survival. The tournament remained a fall affair, bouncing around different venues while Crane’s Astros Foundation funded a $34-million renovation of Memorial Park Golf Course. By 2020, it was back at a revitalized, public Memorial Park Golf Course, and by 2024, the tournament was back in the spring, attracting players ramping up for the Masters. This year, the LPGA Tour’s Chevron Championship is following suit, moving the season-opening major on April 23-26 from The Woodlands to Memorial Park.<\/a> That makes two professional golf tournaments to be hosted in Houston within a span of a month.\u00a0<\/p>\n “I don’t know of any other city that has a PGA Champions Tour event (Insperity Invitational), a PGA Tour event and an LPGA event, especially an LPGA major,” Chevron Championship Executive Director Glenn Weckerlin told Chron. “The reason that’s special is every other major in the U.S., even the U.S. Open Championship, moves around. We’re the only one that stays in one place. So, we’ve created what I think is really, a really cool ‘Golf Mecca,’ with all those different golf tournaments going on, and they’re all clustered within the month of April.”<\/p>\n Professional golf is known for iconic destinations such as Augusta, Georgia; Pebble Beach, California; and Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. But it seems like Houston is a rising name on the scene, with surrounding communities following with renovations to\u00a0public courses like F.M. Law Park<\/a> and\u00a0private courses like Gleannloch Golf Club<\/a>.<\/p>\n “People all over the country are seeing Memorial Park, which is twice the size of Central Park in New York, and it’s just beautiful out there,”\u00a0Astros Golf Foundation Executive Vice President Giles Kibbe told\u00a0Chron. “So, these two tournaments give us an opportunity to showcase that.”\u00a0<\/p>\n Article continues below this ad<\/p>\n But people like\u00a0LPGA athlete Stacey Lewis, who grew up in The Woodlands, say Houston has always been an ideal destination for golf, since weather allows people to play year-round. Maybe people are just now taking notice because the pros are flocking to the city to compete.\u00a0<\/p>\n “I think even 30 years ago, when I was a junior golfer, the access for kids was there,”\u00a0Lewis told Chron. “Houston Golf Association does an amazing job of having tournaments all over the city every single week in the summer at various locations … Then you have Jim Crane and the\u00a0Astros stepping up and doing this to Memorial Park<\/a>, and having the driving range for somebody to come after work. The game is growing in the city, and people are paying attention.”\u00a0<\/p>\n The Astros Golf Foundation has transformed the Houston Open into one of premier sports events in the city, attracting some of the biggest names in golf: Brooks Koepka<\/a>, Scottie Scheffler and more, while also raising millions of dollars for Texas Children’s Hospital and other local non-profits.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n