VERONA — After sending 72 golfers through the streets of Verona on October 3, In City Golf, a tournament played in historic city centers, is planning a first edition in Salzburg, Austria, and has secured Trieste as a host until 2030, founder Kurt Anrather said.
The idea came in September 2009. “I woke at about three in the night with this dream that we were playing golf in a city center,” said Anrather, chief executive of Curtes, a family events agency in Appiano, South Tyrol.
The first tournament was held in Cortina d’Ampezzo, Veneto, in July 2010. Florence, Vienna, Innsbruck, Trento, and Trieste followed, and Anrather counts 44 events in 17 years.
Crowd as audience
Eighteen holes are laid on synthetic turf among the monuments, four players start at each, and every hole has one winner. Players hit soft balls and no street or square is closed, he said. “We have never broken a window, never hurt anyone.”
Entry is by invitation from sponsors and the organizer. “The players are not the prize for a sponsor,” Anrather said. “It is the thousands of people who are in the city center.”
In Verona, players came from seven countries, including Oman, whose ambassador to Italy played, RaiNews reported. Students from ITS Cangrande della Scala, a state technical school, walked with each group as guides, and passersby could try a public hole in Piazza Bra, in front of the Roman Arena. Destination Verona Garda, the area’s tourism foundation, backed the day, with the Due Torri Hotel as clubhouse.
What cities gain
Host cities pay. Trieste’s city government classed the event an “initiative of great impact” and granted its organizers €25,000 a year from 2024 to 2026, a city resolution shows.
Golf tourists in Lombardy spend €300 to €500 a day, more than double the average visitor, yet Italians still see the sport as elitist, a 2026 study by EY for Assolombarda, the regional business association, found.
Trieste and Verona return in June and October, Anrather said, and Mantua, Lombardy, is listed as a new host for 2027 on the event’s website. The Salzburg date will be tied to a European Tour tournament, he said.
“My primary goal is to put the city on show,” he said. For a sport still fighting an elitist image, the street may prove a better stage than the fairway.
