We travelled to Celtic Manor as ISPA Handa launched a superb new initiative for blind and disabled golfers.
Wales Open sponsors offer 1000 free lessons for blind & disabled
Normally, travelling down to play the famed 2010 course at Celtic Manor is always a pleasure, with the horrid weather we'd been having though this trip was a little bit more daunting, but all in a good cause.
With heavy rain bringing Ryder Cup memories flooding back, freezing hail storms offered and even more frightening foe to deal with than the course itself, but this, like I say, was a trip all about spreading the word of a good cause.
Celtic manor will host the Wales Open at the end of May, and tournament sponsors ISPS Handa invited the media down to the Usk Valley to showcase a new initiative which will help blind and disabled golfers to get access to more golf coaching.
The ISPS Handa PGA Academy Programme will provide a thousand free golf lessons for blind and disabled golfers to encourage them to think about either taking up the game of golf, or continuing to develop their golfing skills.
The first stage in this programme has been to train a number of PGA professionals as tutors to deliver the training workshops that will be rolled out over the coming months.
Japanese philanthropist Dr Haruhisa Handa has been supporting blind and disabled golf for more than 25 years, and his future aim is to see golf to become a Paralympic sport.
First lesson
We witnessed PGA professional Craig Thomas, the first to be trained on the programme, coached four golfers, including Celtic Manor club captain and amputee Richie Willis, as part of the ISPS Handa PGA Academy Programme.
Special contests for us including a one-armed driving competition proved to us all just how difficult it was to master - just ask my Sky Sports colleague Jamie Weir who hit his one-armed drive about an inch off the tee!
Us media were paired together and played alongside a blind or disabled golfer around the challenging 2010 Course, we had PR boss Paul Williams with us to guide us, but sadly even he could not prevent the elements giving us a real going over.
Chris our visually impaired golfer and his guide Joy worked in tandem brilliantly, although there were some fiery words, spoken in Welsh, when a putt was missed, I thought it best not to asked for the translation.
Just the way the two worked and seeing the instruction beforehand showed what a worthwhile cause the programme is, getting more blind and disabled people into golf can only be a good thing, and giving away free lessons is the perfect way to ease them in.
Worthy
"It's wonderful to see an initiative like this bringing more disabled people into golf," said Celtic Manor club captain Richie Willis, who wears a prosthetic leg as the result of a road traffic accident 12 years ago.
"I've only had one golf lesson in my entire life so it's great to know specialist tuition for disabled golfers will now be made available.
"I used to be a keen footballer and love my sport so it has been very important to me that I have been able to continue playing golf to a reasonable standard. It keeps my competitive fires burning and I would encourage other disabled people to take up the game."
Richie's story is hopefully one which will be repeated as part of the free lessons programme - hopefully with golf giving more people a way back into sport.
As stated conditions were pretty awful down at Celtic Manor, but the 2010 course held up brilliantly, as you would expect, nothing can compare to the weather which battered it back at the Ryder Cup!
Hopefully conditions will be vastly improved for the ISPS Handa Wales Open from May 31-June 3, but even that event may not be as significant as the one to launch the Academy Programme to help disabled and blind people into the wonderful world of golf.
For more information on the tournament visit www.ispshandawalesopen.com
