Just before sitting down for our interview, Terry Visosky receives a call from an unhappy golfer.
The caller had tracked Mr Visosky to Abu Dhabi Golf Club, where he works as the fitting and club repair specialist.
Tall for a golfer — the man said he was 6ft 5; standard men’s clubs suit those who are about 5ft 11 — he was despairing of how his clubs were affecting his game. Could Mr Visosky help?
“I sorted him pretty quickly,” the fitting guru says, telling the caller that an extra six inches of steel added to lengthen the club would help.
The man was delighted. Could he come in the next day to have the work done?
Mr Visosky gently explains there is already a long queue. With 120 or so pros arriving in town this week ahead of the Abu Dhabi Golf Championship starting tomorrow, all would be relying on the club master, as he is called, to sort them out too.
And Mr Visosky has his work cut out. Abu Dhabi is the first major tournament of the European PGA tour and where all the golfers pick up their new equipment for the year.
“All the 2014 equipment is coming tomorrow, all the brand new stuff,” Mr Visosky says. “And a lot of it needs adjusting and tweaking.”
Before coming to Abu Dhabi in 2001, Mr Visosky had his own golf shop in Vancouver, Canada. As he built up the business, he realised equipment was becoming more sophisticated and golfers needed a better fit. He attended the Professional Clubmakers’ Society school in Kentucky, US, receiving a Class A PCS certification. When he arrived in the region he was the only person with that qualification, Mr Visosky says.
He came to Abu Dhabi because his wife secured a teaching job here. He is phlegmatic about leaving his business behind.
“You’re married and by yourself so you don’t want to stick around [alone] too long,” he says.
He secured employment at Abu Dhabi Golf Club two months after arriving in the emirate, making this weekend’s championship the ninth he will have attended.
Mr Visosky’s workshop is tucked under the clubhouse building, behind rows of bright red golf buggies. Adorning the walls are signed pictures of some of the players he has helped over the years.
“Thanks for saving me,” the UK golfer Oliver Wilson has scribbled across a tear sheet.
He broke his club but, after his repair job, went on to do well in the competition, Mr Visosky explains.
So what exactly does a custom fitting involve?
It could involve changing the length of the club, the size of the grip or the strength of the shaft.
For example, for a tall player using a standard-size club, there will be a tendency for the nose to hit the ground first, sending the ball to the right side. For a smaller player, the heel will strike the ground first, similarly knocking the ball off course.
“You’d never go into a store and pick the first suit off the rack and think it’s going to fit and that’s exactly the way clubs and sporting equipment is going,” he says. “The equipment I use is extremely specialised — to adjust all this steel needs somebody who knows what they are doing with it. That’s my speciality.”
With the stakes so high, has Mr Visosky ever been blamed if a golfer plays a bad shot?
“Over the eight, nine years on the tour, I’ve never had a problem, “ he says.
He also has support from the manufacturers that make the equipment: the likes of Nike Golf, Ping and Callaway.
Representatives are on hand during the tournament to provide instruction and at various times during the year.
“I am backed up by the factory and that’s where I am pretty much way ahead of everyone else,” Mr Visosky says. “I stay in the loop. I know what’s going on before anyone else in the country.”
In the days before the tournament, he relocates his workshop to a tent near where play will be. He will sort through his inventory of shafts and grips so he’s all set.
Repairs can take anything from a few seconds to an hour and during the tournament the clubmaster will have his nose to the grindstone morning, noon and night. Opportunities for spectating are scant.
“I’ve never seen an actual golf tournament here in all those years,” he reflects. “But the last two years … my wife’s pulled me out my shop and said ‘Let’s go.’ Because if something did break I could run [back] in and fix it. I’ve watched the last putt the last two years but that’s basically it. That’s as much golf as I see. It’s that busy.”
lgutcher@thenational.ae
The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
Skewed figures
In the village of Mevagissey in southwest England the housing stock has doubled in the last century while the number of residents is half the historic high. The village's Neighbourhood Development Plan states that 26% of homes are holiday retreats. Prices are high, averaging around £300,000, £50,000 more than the Cornish average of £250,000. The local average wage is £15,458.
Name: Brendalle Belaza
From: Crossing Rubber, Philippines
Arrived in the UAE: 2007
Favourite place in Abu Dhabi: NYUAD campus
Favourite photography style: Street photography
Favourite book: Harry Potter
Specs
Engine: Dual-motor all-wheel-drive electric
Range: Up to 610km
Power: 905hp
Torque: 985Nm
Price: From Dh439,000
Available: Now
Kanye%20West
%3Cp%3EYe%20%E2%80%94%20the%20rapper%20formerly%20known%20as%20Kanye%20West%20%E2%80%94%20has%20seen%20his%20net%20worth%20fall%20to%20%24400%20million%20in%20recent%20weeks.%20That%E2%80%99s%20a%20precipitous%20drop%20from%20Bloomberg%E2%80%99s%20estimates%20of%20%246.8%20billion%20at%20the%20end%20of%202021.%3Cbr%3EYe%E2%80%99s%20wealth%20plunged%20after%20business%20partners%2C%20including%20Adidas%2C%20severed%20ties%20with%20him%20on%20the%20back%20of%20anti-Semitic%20remarks%20earlier%20this%20year.%3Cbr%3EWest%E2%80%99s%20present%20net%20worth%20derives%20from%20cash%2C%20his%20music%2C%20real%20estate%20and%20a%20stake%20in%20former%20wife%20Kim%20Kardashian%E2%80%99s%20shapewear%20firm%2C%20Skims.%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
Other acts on the Jazz Garden bill
Sharrie Williams
The American singer is hugely respected in blues circles due to her passionate vocals and songwriting. Born and raised in Michigan, Williams began recording and touring as a teenage gospel singer. Her career took off with the blues band The Wiseguys. Such was the acclaim of their live shows that they toured throughout Europe and in Africa. As a solo artist, Williams has also collaborated with the likes of the late Dizzy Gillespie, Van Morrison and Mavis Staples.
Lin Rountree
An accomplished smooth jazz artist who blends his chilled approach with R‘n’B. Trained at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, DC, Rountree formed his own band in 2004. He has also recorded with the likes of Kem, Dwele and Conya Doss. He comes to Dubai on the back of his new single Pass The Groove, from his forthcoming 2018 album Stronger Still, which may follow his five previous solo albums in cracking the top 10 of the US jazz charts.
Anita Williams
Dubai-based singer Anita Williams will open the night with a set of covers and swing, jazz and blues standards that made her an in-demand singer across the emirate. The Irish singer has been performing in Dubai since 2008 at venues such as MusicHall and Voda Bar. Her Jazz Garden appearance is career highlight as she will use the event to perform the original song Big Blue Eyes, the single from her debut solo album, due for release soon.
Ammar 808:
Maghreb United
Sofyann Ben Youssef
Glitterbeat
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
