The Handa Cup and Dr. Haruhisa Handa

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A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the Legends Tour and their first major, won by Sherri Steinhauer.

Well, the legendary ladies were on course again this past weekend in St. Augustine, FL, for the fourth edition of the Handa Cup.

The Slammer & Squire course at World Golf Village was the setting for this international team event that pits a US team against an International one, based on a similar format to the Presidents Cup, and Team USA... captained this year by by Kathy Whitworth... took the trophy for the fourth consecutive time. Her Legends Tour team included seven Hall of Famers. Results and photos from the event can be found on the Legends Tour website with additional reporting on the LPGA's website and FrontPageGolf.

In reading about the Legends Tour and their events over the past few weeks, I learned about the extraordinary and inspiring Dr. Haruhisa Handa who, with his company International Sports Promotion Society (ISPS), is title sponsor of the Handa Cup.

Dr. Handa has been involved in international golf for almost 25 years, advising professional tours and sponsoring tournaments. He's the Honorary Chairman of the Legends Tour and an advisor to the European Senior Tour. He's also Chairman of the Women’s Senior Golf Association and was recently made an official Patron of Golf Australia. Dr. Handa has been called the “Father of Blind Golf” for having founded the first blind golf club in Japan and for his dedication to International Blind Golf.

The thing that's amazing is that this just scratches the surface of the remarkable Japanese businessman's golf involvement. And the thing that's even more amazing is that Dr. Handa is also is also an accomplished composer, calligrapher, author, Noh actor, motivational speaker and opera singer. His philanthropic work has a global reach with projects in many countries. And again there's much more than that.

That's why I'm definitely planning to write more about Dr. Haruhisa Handa in the near future. He's a true Renaissance Man and the golf world is very fortunate to have his support.