Two Routt County residents have been selected to compete in the Colorado Golf Association Mid-Amateur Championships at Haymaker Golf Course starting Friday morning. 

Ben Johnson and Michael Feyen finished first and second among local golfers in the Steamboat Springs City Championship event last week and will be two of 84 Colorado golfers to compete in the three-day Mid-Am event this weekend.

Haymaker Golf Professional Cody Hasten said this is the biggest CGA event of the year for age-25-and-up amateur golfers and he is excited to have Colorado’s top players see what Routt County has to offer. Haymaker hosted the event once before, in 2003.

“The CGA came to us last fall and asked if we would like to host,” Hasten said. “It is a great event for us, great publicity, and we are happy to show off the championship course we have out here.”

The event begins with rounds on Friday and Saturday, after which bottom-half golfers will be cut and top-half golfers will advance to Sunday, when the champion will be crowned. 

To qualify for the event, golfers finished in the top-8 of any of the CGA’s qualifier rounds or punched their tickets through top performances in other tournaments throughout the golf season. 

According to Hasten, the Haymaker crew has worked all summer to ensure that the course is in top shape for the event. He said the crew has done extra mowing and extra rolling to ensure the greens are fast and true. 

“That is always a good teller of the quality of a golf course, the greens,” Hasten said. “The greens right now are by far the best we have seen here this year.”

Hasten said Haymaker hosted numerous practice rounds for the Mid-Am golfers on Thursday and it appeared a large percentage of them had not previously had the opportunity to play the course.

“We are proud to be able to host and show off what a great golf course we have,” Hasten said. “A lot of the golfers who have finished their practice rounds are really excited about the course and we are happy to have them.”