The second annual Party Golfers Ladies Open will commence tomorrow as an international field of 90 players will have to be jockeying through 54 holes on the National Garden Golf & Country Club, playing to 6,139 yards at a par 72, in the NT$3 million TLPGA Tour event. A cutline will be set after 36 holes with the top 50 and ties advancing. The winner will earn a NT$600,000 prize check and the runner-up takes NT$300,000.

Due to a sustaining injury, defending champion Kanphanitnan Muangkhumsakul of Thailand, unfortunately, had to pull out last minute, which set up a good opportunity for local player including last year’s runner-up Chien Pei-Yun (錢珮芸).

Other home contenders include current money leader on the TLPGA tour, Kuo Ai-Chen (郭艾榛), no.3 Lin Tzu-Chi (林子麒), no.5 Yeh Hsin Ning (葉欣寧), no.9 Hsieh Yu-Ling (謝瑀玲). 2015 tour winners Chen Meng-Chu (陳孟竺), Liang Yi-Lin (梁宜羚), Shih Huei-Ju (石惠如), and Chen Yi-Wen (陳依妏) will also be looking to secure the trophy for home fans.

Apart from the Taiwanese women, it will also feature players representing seven countries including Thailand, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Australia, Britain, and Vietnam. The players will tee it up tomorrow at 7:00 in the morning on 1st and 10th.

An 18-hole Pro-Am took place on Tuesday, drawing 29 TLPGA Tour pros who joined 85 local amateur golfers on the National Garden Golf Course. Lee Hsin (李欣), partnering Hsiang Ying-Shan, Ruan Bai-Yi, and Lu Huei-Min won the event and each was given a Garmin S6 watch.

The title sponsor, the Party Golfers, is an amateur golf team comprised of local businessmen, who share the passion for the golf sport and align with the vision of the TLPGA. They collected donation among team members to cover up 80% of the expenses to push the launch of the Party Golfers Ladies Open starting in 2014, in hope of creating a stepping stone for local female golfers to further excel in the game especially with the official world ranking points on offer.

“We used very little time to put together this event last year, especially thanks to the great assistance from the National Garden Golf and Country Club, and we feel like we’ve had tremendous improvement in every aspect of it in this second staging,” said team founder and chairperson Kuo Tai-Chiang, who announced a 3-year commitment to host the Party Golfers Ladies Open on the National Garden Golf and Country Club and hoped the tournament will propel Taiwan’s female athletes into the Rio Olympics 2016.

“We’re just extremely honored to take part in this important time and pledge our support to the tour and our players.” Kuo, on the Pro-Am dinner, said the Party Golfers will award bonus cash prizes for Taiwanese players who wrapped it up on Friday in the top 3, which include a bonus NT$400,000 to the champion, NT$200,000 to the runner-up, and NT$100,000 to the third-place finisher.

Now recognized as one of the nine member tours of the World Women’s Golf Rankings, the TLPGA Tour has been progressing from strength to strength over the years. This year, it boasts a total purse of NT$185 million in a record 25 events and 4 oversea stops. In 2014, there were just 28 Taiwanese female golfers with professional world rankings compared to this year’s 40.

This week’s backdrop, the National Garden Golf and Country Club, in celebration of its 20th anniversary, has recently undergone a series of makeover including boosting the speed level of the greens for better entertainment of the game. Despite lasting rain over the past days, course manager Wu Hsien-Hung said the crew would be working to promise a pleasant condition before the players arrive.

Tournament referee Liu Yu-He announced on Tuesday that the three rounds will be conducted under the “preferred lies” rule.