Led by Deryck Gon­salves, team T&T will tee off in fierce com­pe­ti­tion against eight oth­er teams from coun­tries around the re­gion at the RBC 56th An­nu­al Caribbean Am­a­teur Golf Cham­pi­onships (CAGC) set to take place in St Kitts from Au­gust 6 to 12, 2012. In com­ment­ing on the team's chances in this year's tour­na­ment, Gon­salves was op­ti­mistic, say­ing that the team is ad­e­quate­ly pre­pared for both the course and the com­pe­ti­tion. T&T will have to re­ly on the in­di­vid­ual skills of its play­ers as they strive to cop six tro­phies in six cat­e­gories: the Men's Open Com­pe­ti­tion- Ho­er­man Cup (Deryck Gon­salves, Tal­in Ra­jen­dranath, Alder­ray Downes and Jake De­laney, the Men's Over-50- Fran­cis and Steele-Perkins Tro­phy (Car­los Baynes and Michael Com­mis­siong), the Men's Over-60- Hig­gs and Hig­gs Tro­phy (Ar­joon Sam­lal and Fabi­an Lee Foon), the Men's Over 35- Ra­mon Baez Tro­phy (Ma­hen­dra Ra­jku­mar and Clint Al­fred, the Ladies' Open Cham­pi­onship- George Teale Tro­phy (Moni­fa Sealy, Kelsey Lou Hing and Brit­tany Mar­quez), Over­all Team Cham­pi­onship- Arthur Zaide Tro­phy (Deryck Gon­salves, Tal­in Ra­jen­dranath, Alder­ray Downes, Jake De­laney, Car­los Baynes, Michael Com­mis­siong, Ar­joon Sam­lal, Fabi­an Lee Foon, Ma­hen­dra Ra­jku­mar, Clint Al­fred, Moni­fa Sealy, Kelsey Lou Hing and Brit­tany Mar­quez.

For the sec­ond con­sec­u­tive year, RBC is the ti­tle spon­sor of the Cham­pi­onships. The Bank's sup­port comes in large mea­sure from an over­all strat­e­gy to pro­mote, as well as in­te­grate golf in­to the wider com­mu­ni­ty. Arvin­der Bharath, Mar­ket Head, Per­son­al Bank­ing, RBC re-em­pha­sised the Bank's com­mit­ment to the event, golf and the re­gion, say­ing: "RBC is proud to once again sup­port the CAGC. Our de­ci­sion to get on board is dri­ven by our de­sire to el­e­vate the game in the Caribbean much in the same way that we have in Cana­da and the Unit­ed States through our par­ent com­pa­ny RBC." Mak­ing its re­turn, is one of the most an­tic­i­pat­ed at­trac­tions of the Cham­pi­onships, Birdies for Char­i­ty – RBC's so­cial re­spon­si­bil­i­ty ini­tia­tive in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Caribbean Golf As­so­ci­a­tion (CGA), where RBC will con­tribute a max­i­mum of USD$45,000 to be di­vid­ed among the par­tic­i­pat­ing teams to be do­nat­ed to the char­i­ty of their choice.

Speak­ing on the team's do­na­tion to Habi­tat for Hu­man­i­ty, Gon­salves said, "We are de­light­ed to be able to play our part through this do­na­tion to Habi­tat for Hu­man­i­ty, whom we tru­ly be­lieve to be an or­gan­i­sa­tion full of en­er­gy and com­mit­ment in every­thing they do. They are an amaz­ing group of peo­ple that per­forms an in­valu­able ser­vice to the na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty as well as those chil­dren and adults who ben­e­fit from their hard work."The RBC 56th An­nu­al Caribbean Am­a­teur Golf Cham­pi­onships, host­ed by the Roy­al St Kitts Golf Club, will once again bring out the best in the com­pe­ti­tion over an 18-hole, Par 71 course at 6,900 yards from the cham­pi­onship gold tees. The ex­tra­or­di­nary lay­out al­so boasts wa­ter haz­ards on 10 holes, 80 bunkers and a mul­ti­tude of co­conut palm trees along the At­lantic Ocean. St Kitts has host­ed the Cham­pi­onships in pre­vi­ous years and is re­gard­ed by many re­gion­al play­ers as one of the best con­di­tioned and most scenic golf cours­es in the Caribbean. For more in­for­ma­tion, vis­it the CGA's web site at: www.cgagolfnet.com or The Roy­al St Kitts Golf Club at www.roy­al­stkitts­golf­club.com.