Pensacola...the Perfect Arena for Spectator Sports!
Pensacola, FL -When it comes to sports, Pensacola is a major player...they are also a City of Champions, host of amateur and professional tournaments, and a terrific venue for all kinds of athletic competitions. Pensacola's own athletic greats include world heavyweight boxing champion Roy Jones Jr., Arizona Cardinals running back Emmitt Smith, PGA golfer Joe Durant, star baseball pitcher Don Sutton, Tampa Bay Buccaneer linebacker Derrick Brooks, and the player who scored the 2001 World Series winning run, Jay Bell of the Arizona Diamondbacks. Maybe it's the weather, the rolling surf or even the color of the water...but something encourages athletes and sports entusiasts of all kinds to get out there and...play!
Golfing is seen all along the Panhandle of Florida. Saying that there's a myriad of golf courses there would be an understatement, to say the least! Big name courses, designed by big name architects like Robert Trent Jones, seem to be, well...just everywhere! And none finer than the Moors Golf Club, patterned after a links course in Scotland, the very home of golf! The Moors is home to the Blue Angels Classic, a major senior PGA tournament, held this year April 12-18, when Pensacola temperatures are perfect...in other words it's not too HOT!
Racing at Five Flags Speedway,
Ice Pilots hockey, Pelicans baseball, and PGA golf tournaments
are just a few of the sports you can enjoy in Pensacola!
Northwest Florida is proud of being known as "the home of the Blue Angels" and now there are two events that celebrate that esteemed honor-the Blue Angels airshows, of course, and now the Blue Angels Classic, an official Champion's Tour event. It's a three-day, 54 hole competition, preceded by a two-day Pro-Am and a day of practice rounds. There's a 1.5 million dollar purse but the real winners are the many charities that benefit from this event...a wide variety of non-profit groups which serve health care, education, children's services, the community, the arts and athletics. All in all, the Blue Angels Classic has been a stronghold for the Pensacola area as well as one of the leading charitable organizations in Florida's Northwest Panhandle.For a schedule of events, check out www.blueangelclassic.com/events
The Pensacola Ice Pilots have been instrumental in bringing another great sport to Northwest Florida...ice hockey... and the fans are lovin' it! The Ice Pilots are part of the East Coast Hockey League and they get down and dirty in "The Hangar" (Pensacola Civic Center) during the fall and winter . The Ice Pilots are coached by Todd Gordon and their home games can be an exciting event with over 8,000 screaming fans in the Pensacola Civic Center. Other fun teams in the Western Conference are the Columbus Cottonmouths (does everyone fear the poisonous cottonmouth snake as much as Southerners do?), the Gwinnett Gladiators, Louisiana Ica Gators (now there's a misnomer), the Augusta Lynx, Mississippi Sea Wolves (huh?) and the Texas Wildcatters! With the proliferation of sports team in every arena, it must be increasingly hard to keep coming up with good names...but hey, it's all about the game and hockey is FUN!
So is racing...and Pensacola has the Five Flags Speedway, which hosts very interesting auto racing competitions, including its annual Snowball Derby now in its 30th year! With nearly 51 years of racing in the books at the historic half-mile oval, Tim Bryant of Bryant Motorsports, LLC, recently announced the 2004 schedule for racing at Five Flags Speedway. Operating under the celebratory theme of "Five Decades of Speed", the new management team made up of the Bryant brothers, Tim, Randy and Rick, along with their father Bill, will guide the speedway in some new directions in hopes of bringing back fans and competitors. A bi-weekly schedule with a handful of special events and a new-and-reduced pricing structure, are at the heart of the Bryant's plan.
Five Flags Speedway has operated every season
since opening its gates on May 31, 1953. The first feature race
was abbreviated to a one-lap event when fourteen cars piled into
each other on the front straightaway. Two weeks later, Herb Thomas
won the only NASCAR Grand National (now Nextel Cup) race at the
storied oval over Dick Rathman and Lee Petty. For more information
and a race schedule, run to www.fiveflagsspeedway.com
