September 18, 2007

The Gateway Collegiate Tour, in its inaugural season, has just announced its Board of Advisors.

Topping the impressive list is the coach of the 2007 NCAA DI National Champion Stanford University Men’s golf team, Conrad Ray. Ray is a former player on The Gateway Tour during his days as a playing professional after he played at Stanford as a collegiate golfer himself, and The Gateway Collegiate Tour is honored to have his valuable input and support to ensure it continues to move in the right direction.

Along with Ray, Gregg Grost, the Executive Director of the Golf Coaches Association of America, has also come on board with The Gateway Collegiate Tour. Before his time with the GCAA, Grost coached the likes of the University of Oklahoma and Lamar University, and his in-depth knowledge of the inner-workings of college golf on all levels from his time and connections in collegiate golf will prove invaluable to The Collegiate Tour as it continues to grow and expand in its opportunity to collegiate golfers.

Other Board members include Jamie Bermel, Mark Hankins, and Jay Horton from Colorado State University, the University of Iowa, and Iowa State University respectively. Bermel has coached the likes of 2007 Masters Champion, Zach Johnson, during his days at Drake University, Hankins led his Michigan State Spartans to a Co-Big Ten Championship title in the Spring of 2007 and a 23rd place finish nationally, before making the switch to the University of Iowa, and Horton has coached competitive teams in one of the top NCAA Division I conferences for the past 8 years.

The Gateway Collegiate Tour’s Board of Advisors will continue to grow as the Tour launches its inaugural tournaments Dec. 19-21, at The Wigwam Resort, in Litchfield Park, AZ, and January 7-9, at Martin Downs C.C., in Palm City, FL; but even with these initial members of The Gateway Collegiate Tour’s Board of Advisors, Gateway Tour Executive Director, Charley Yandell, is pleased to have such powerful entities from Collegiate Golf on board.

“I’m very pleased and honored these leaders of college golf have decided to help us with our Collegiate Tour,” noted Yandell. “Their input and direction will be crucial to our success and adaptation, and I’m confident we’re entering the collegiate with the right input behind us. I’m very excited, as is all of our staff, to finally be able to put into practice what we’ve been striving for so long to develop into as a Tour…We’re very excited to be able to offer this opportunity to collegiate golfers, and the input of our Board members has already made an invaluable impact on our direction as a Tour.”

The Gateway Collegiate Tour will offer one tournament this holiday season during student-athletes’ breaks in both Arizona and Florida, and the Tour will be expanding into playing 4 events in both states during their Summer Breaks.