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CN CANADIAN WOMEN'S OPEN CHAMPIONSHIP


August 13, 2006


Sean Van Kesteren


LONDON, ONTARIO

DANA GROSS RHODE: Thanks for coming in. It's been a great week so far. Talk about the week and maybe your expectations coming into the tournament and have they exceeded them? Have they met them?

SEAN VAN KESTEREN: Yeah, it's more than fair to say we've exceeded our expectations, not only with numbers but with the weather, with the comments from the players and the caddies, the LPGA staff. They've been very complimentary. This is a big event for us. This is the biggest we've ever had, there's no question about it. If we continue to build on this momentum next year in Edmonton, we'll be very, very thrilled.

And I know CN is very pleased. And that's very important. And they look forward to providing even more support for the event in the future.

Q. Can you comment on Loren Rubenstein's column yesterday about London being a B market and they wanted to take this tournament to A cities?

SEAN VAN KESTEREN: I have not read that. Sorry. I'm not up to speed on some of the things that have been written. But B market, certainly not. I think he's probably referring to demographics and population, maybe. I'm not too sure. This is an A market, I can tell you that right now. The proof is in the pudding, and the pudding looks pretty good out there.

Certainly we would enjoy the success that we've had there. There's no question that you know, we're just thrilled. It's tough to really put into words at this point in time. It's the last day of the event and there's a bit of euphoria around here. Hopefully everybody is feeling that as well.

And the championship, with Angela Stanford playing as great as she is and the golf course playing the way it is, it's going to be a great finish.

Q. Did you have a goal for attendance before the week started, and what was it?

SEAN VAN KESTEREN: We were looking at between 50,000 and 60,000 people. We knew the market could support that here. Our ticket sales went very, very well, from a corporate standpoint, very early on and our daily tickets and clubhouse badges went very, very well very early on. We sold out of clubhouse badges months in advance, so that's indicative of what we thought was going to happen. 56,000 is a lot of people at an LPGA event. That's a lot of people. And certainly it would be interesting to see what the numbers are today.

Q. Have you had any glitches along the way?

SEAN VAN KESTEREN: Glitches? Always glitches. Hopefully you haven't seen any. No, it's been very, very smooth. A lot of that can be attributed to the committee that Doug Alexander and Susan Holly (ph) together. And the golf club has been phenomenal under Larry McKenzie's experience.

When you don't expect such a large number of people, there's going to be some glitches with parking and stuff like that. We had a backup plan. We always have other lots that we can use. And so when you have plan A, B, and C for parking, we had to pull those into play and it worked well, everything that's gone on today and yesterday, as smooth as silk. And a lot of praise goes to the city for helping with the parking and the policing out there. It's great. It's nice to see a line of cars coming into a golf event.

Q. What's the initial feedback from the sponsor?

SEAN VAN KESTEREN: I would say they're elated. Certainly you would have to talk to them to get a nice quote, but by all indications they are very, very thrilled with the event, with the LPGA Tour, with how we've run the event in the first year, and they seem very excited and looking forward to Edmonton.

Q. Would you recommend they come back here, and how soon would you recommend they come back here, if that was the case?

SEAN VAN KESTEREN: Certainly I think it's premature to look at right now. We'll look at how the event went and talk to CN and see what they want to do. Certainly that's a major factor. Certainly we would love to come back if all the chips fell that way. But certainly it's a little early to decide on that.

Q. Hunter was saying today that he would like to see, and CN was willing to sort of do what they can to make this tournament, perhaps restore it as a Major. I was wondering sort of your thoughts on that.

SEAN VAN KESTEREN: Every event on tour would like to be a Major. There's no question. That's a little ways down the road. But certainly we would like to work towards that. We have to have goals, and you have to have lofty goals, but I think we're moving in the right direction with or without the Major status.

There are things you can do to have a Major feel and I would put us up against any event on the LPGA Tour right now in terms of how we run the event, the look, the feel. Certainly the purse is there and could be even larger in the future with CN's support. And obviously we're in a position now to grow the event. The players are thrilled, the caddies are thrilled. They've had the best time of their life in the Caddieshack this week. If anybody hasn't had a chance to interview them, I suggest going over there to get their perspective. They go to a lot of events and they'll tell you how well they've been treated and the players have been treated. And the golf course, it's fantastic. It's playing tough today, too.

End of FastScripts.

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