Greater Vancouver Open

Air Canada Championship
Tournament information
Location	Surrey, British Columbia, Canada
Established	1958
Course(s)	Northview Golf & Country Club; (Ridge Course)
Par	71
Length	7,065 yards (6,460 m)
Tour(s)	PGA Tour
Format	Stroke play
Prize fund	US$3,500,000
Month played	August/September
Final year	2002
Tournament record score
Aggregate	265 Mark Calcavecchia (1997); 265 Brandel Chamblee (1998); 265 Joel Edwards (2001)
To par	−19 as above
Final champion
	Gene Sauers
Location map
	Northview G&CC Location in Canada Northview G&CC Location in British Columbia

The Greater Vancouver Open was a professional golf tournament in Canada on the PGA Tour, held in southwestern British Columbia from 1996 to 2002. It was played after the majors in late summer, at the Northview Golf & Country Club in Surrey, a suburb southeast of Vancouver.

History

For its first three years, it was an alternate event in late August, concurrent with the NEC World Series of Golf at Firestone in Akron, Ohio. In 1999, the new Reno-Tahoe Open became the alternate event for the WGC-NEC Invitational at Firestone. The Vancouver tournament was promoted to a regular tour event and scheduled a week later, as the Greater Milwaukee Open moved up to July. Renamed the "Air Canada Championship," sponsored by the country's leading airline, it was coupled with the Canadian Open for consecutive tournaments north of the U.S. border in early September.

Mike Weir won that year for the first of his eight tour wins; he became the first Canadian to win a PGA Tour event on home soil in 45 years.^[2]^[3]

The purses grew substantially during the run of the event, from $1 million to $3.5 million in six years. It was replaced on the schedule in 2003 by the Deutsche Bank Championship in Massachusetts, near Boston.

This was not the first time the PGA Tour included a stop in British Columbia on their schedule. Dow Finsterwald won the unofficial 1955 British Columbia Open Invitational, and Jim Ferree was victorious at the 1958 Vancouver Open Invitational.^[4]

Winners

Year	Winner	Score	To par	Margin of victory	Runner(s)-up	Purse (US$)	Winner's share ($)	Ref.
Air Canada Championship
2002	Gene Sauers	269	−15	1 stroke	Steve Lowery	3,500,000	630,000	^[1]
2001	Joel Edwards	265	−19	7 strokes	Steve Lowery	3,400,000	612,000	^[5]
2000	Rory Sabbatini	268	−16	1 stroke	Grant Waite	3,000,000	540,000	^[6]^[7]
1999	Mike Weir	266	−18	2 strokes	Fred Funk	2,500,000	450,000	^[2]^[3]
Greater Vancouver Open
1998	Brandel Chamblee	265	−19	3 strokes	Payne Stewart	2,000,000	360,000	^[8]
1997	Mark Calcavecchia	265	−19	1 stroke	Andrew Magee	1,500,000	270,000	^[9]
1996	Guy Boros	272	−12	1 stroke	Emlyn Aubrey Lee Janzen Taylor Smith	1,000,000	180,000	^[10]
1959–1995: No tournament
Vancouver Open Invitational
1958	Jim Ferree	270	−18	1 stroke	Billy Casper	42,000	6,400

References

^ ^a ^b "Golf: PGA Tour at Surrey, British Columbia". Eugene Register-Guard. (Oregon). September 2, 2002. p. 6E.
^ ^a ^b "Oh Canada! Weir wins". Spokesman-Review. (Spokane, Washington). wire services. September 6, 1999. p. C2.
^ ^a ^b "Eagle lifts Weir to Air Canada title". Toledo Blade. (Ohio). wire services. September 6, 1999. p. 32.
^ "Air Canada Championships 2001-Event Preview". Archived from the original on 2014-07-19. Retrieved 2009-05-27.
^ "Golf: PGA Tour". Eugene Register-Guard. (Oregon). September 3, 2001. p. 4E.
^ "PGA". Spokesman-Review. (Spokane, Washington). Associated Press. September 4, 2000. p. C2.
^ "Air Canada Championship". Spokesman-Review. (Spokane, Washington). Associated Press. September 4, 2000. p. C7.
^ "Greater Vancouver Open". Spokesman-Review. (Spokane, Washington). Associated Press. August 31, 1998. p. C7.
^ "Golf: Greater Vancouver Open". Wilmington Morning Star. (North Carolina). August 25, 1997. p. 8B.
^ "Golf: Greater Vancouver Open". Eugene Register-Guard. (Oregon). August 26, 1996. p. 6B.