Greater Cedar Rapids Open gives amateur golfers a shot to test themselves against pros

MARION — For amateur golfers like Garrett Nurre and Logan Otting, this week is quite valuable.

After helping Cedar Rapids Xavier reach the boys’ state golf tournament last fall, Nurre and Otting will take a swing among professionals at the Greater Cedar Rapids Open golf tournament, which begins Thursday at Hunters Ridge Golf Course.

“I’ve caddied for it the past couple of years and just thought about playing in it,” Nurre said. “I thought my game was good enough to see where I stand with them.”

Nurre graduated from Xavier in the spring as a two-time first team all-Mississippi Valley Conference golfer and the school record-holder for 18-hole average, nine-hole average and combined adjusted average in a season. At the GCRO in 2022 and 2023, Nurre caddied for Florida professional Patrick Lundy, who golfed collegiately at Duke and will be back at Hunters Ridge again this year.

“It’s fun to see their routines and how they practice on the range and see what they do before their tournaments,” Nurre said. “It will be cool to see them out there and play and compete against them and just see kind of where I stand with them and see how my game is compared to theirs.”

Summer tournaments serve as good preparation before Nurre joins the men’s golf team at Kirkwood, which won the NJCAA Division-II national championship in 2023 and finished second at nationals in May. Last month, Nurre competed in the Iowa Junior Amateur Championship at Ames and placed second.

“It was really tough weather the first two days,” Nurre said. “Just tried to battle through it.”

While Nurre has exhausted his prep eligibility, Otting is just getting started. After completing his first year of varsity golf at Xavier, the rising sophomore has had a busy summer. Otting has played in a dozen tournaments since April, highlighted by three wins in the Boys 14-15 division at the Iowa PGA Junior Spring Series, the JPM Enterprises Twin Pines Junior tournament and — at Hunters Ridge — the Greater Cedar Rapids Junior tournament.

Much like Nurre, this will be the first time Otting will be competing in the GCRO.

“Just to see how I could stack up,” Otting said. “There's some good competition for amateurs and just to see if I could hang with any of the pros. … The tees that we are playing are pretty far back, so just be patient. It’s going to be tougher than most courses I play. Just to not get too down on yourself if you have a bad hole or a bad shot.”

Nurre and Otting are among 16 amateurs in the 96-player field. Of the professionals, Jewell native Trevor Ullestad is fresh off a win in last weekend’s Waterloo Open.

The three-round GCRO tournament runs Thursday, Friday and — for those that make the cut — the championship round is Saturday. Admission is free to the public.

“We've got some players that are all different stages,” GCRO Tournament Chairman Jim McPartland said. “That's kind of neat. Some of them are amateurs, some really young amateurs and some of them are just getting out of college and still trying to figure out if they want to go pro. … Some of the pros have played in PGA tournaments, some of them have played in the Korn Ferry tournaments and a lot of them are trying to qualify for all those things. It's just a myriad of different stages for everybody.”