This month's planned Bathurst Open on Octber 23 and 24 was recently cancelled due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, even though there was still a strong chance that lockdown laws could be relaxed in time to allow it to go ahead.

Bathurst Golf Club general manager Brad Constable said it made sense to make an early decision.

"I know we're heading towards freedom day but there's obviously a few issues still with travelling so we thought it was pertinent to can it this year and just focus on giving the members a two-day event," he said.

"We would probably be pushing the envelope a little bit if we ran it so we felt it was better to be safe than sorry.

"We'd heard about that freedom date being around the 11^th, or possibly the 18^th, but that was all subject to vaccination rates so no-one knew anything concrete.

"We felt it was better to err on the side of caution just for this year."

The club don't want to let the loss of the Bathurst Open prevent members from enjoying some form of competitive environment over its originally scheduled weekend.

Instead of a combined two round score the weekend will instead be broken up into two different competitions for members to participate in.

"We're looking to just focus on our members, running a two day event over Saturday and Sunday," Constable said.

"We'll have an overall winner on Saturday and an overall winner on Sunday, so it will be run as two separate competitions.

"One of the issues we're finding at the moment is getting the amount of people on the course, so if we break it over two days we're likely to have people picking one day or the other."

Constable said the idea of other Central West club members being involved isn't completely off the agenda but it's not the priority.

"If travel is allowed and there's a spot available then someone from Orange could be allowed to play, but we'll definitely be starting with members," he said.

The Bathurst Open did manage to go ahead in 2020, with Lachlan Jones taking out the title.

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