The Challenge Tour will return to Turkey for the first time in 11 years when Carya Golf Club in Belek, Antalya, hosts the Turkish Challenge. The €175,000 tournament is part of a three-year agreement between the Challenge Tour and Carya Golf Club and heralds the start of a partnership that will help promote the Antalya region, which boasts 15 courses, as a golfing destination. Designed by five-times Open Champion Peter Thomson and partners Ross Perrett and Tim Lobb, Carya Golf Club opened in 2008 and is regarded as one of the best courses on Turkey’s Mediterranean Coast. Inspired by the classic courses found in the UK, such as Sunningdale and The Berkshire, nearly one million heather sprigs have been planted around the course. In a first-of-its-kind project, the heather was propagated on site in specially-constructed glasshouses. The course, which measures 7,186 yards (or 6,570 metres) in length, runs between established woodland and across a dramatic sand ridge. The event will provide a perfect opportunity to further develop golf in Turkey from the grass roots up, with five Turkish professionals and three amateurs due to be included in the field.