The International Sports Promotion Society (ISPS) held the ISPS Handa Jaermann & Stubi Owners Cup, which saw amateur golfers who own Jaermann & Stubi watches play golf with prominent professionals such as Ernie Els and Jumbo Ozaki, in the Hakone resort area of Kanagawa Prefecture on April 16 and 17.
Other participating professionals were Lee Westwood, Padraig Harrington, Minjee Lee and Jumbo brothers — Tateo Ozaki and Naomichi Ozaki. Also, former New Zealand Prime Minister John Key, who was in office from November 2008 until December 2016 and became an ambassador for the ISPS in February last year, as well as ISPS Chairman Haruhisa Handa, who is also president of watch marketer Misuzu Corp., the exclusive distributor of Jaermann & Stubi watches, which are known as “The Timepieces of Golf,” in Japan.
ISPS has brought on many golfers as its ambassadors, who believe in the idealism of the nonprofit organization’s mission to promote blind golf and world peace via sports. Els, Westwood, Harrington and Lee are among some of the professional golfers who are ISPS international ambassadors.
Els, who has an autistic son and has created the foundation, Els for Autism, to raise awareness of autism and support autistic people and their families, is one of those who have supported ISPS and Handa.
“I have never seen anyone doing as many charity activities as Dr. Handa does in the world,” the South African Els said at the Hakonekohan Golf Course on April 17, referring to Handa’s activities as ISPS chairman, as well as the chairman of Worldwide Support for Development and other nonprofit organizations. “As an ambassador, I would like to tell the world about what ISPS is doing.”
Els and Handa both have connections to South Africa. The ISPS supports Fives Futbol, a movement to make soccer fields in cities and promote soccer in Els’ home country, and it was a main sponsor for the Mpumalanga Black Aces F.C., which is now F.C. Cape Town.
Dozens of amateurs who participated in the event have bought at least one Jaermann & Stubi watch, which range in price from about ¥300,000 to several millions of yen. Golf lover Urs Jaermann and watch master Pascal Stubi founded the brand in 2007 to create precision Swiss watches that can record golf scores.
The company only produces about 1,000 watches a year and all are handmade. Melted irons belonging to famous golfers such as Ian Woosnam and Seve Ballesteros are used to make some of the watch cases.
On both days, a mix of professionals and amateurs competed for the grand prize of ¥3 million and a green haori jacket. The total prize money awarded over the two days was ¥30 million.
On April 16, Westwood carded an 11-under par to grab the championship, followed by Harrington, at 10-under. Akihito Yokoyama took third place.
On April 17, Thorbjorn Olesen and Westwood finished first and second, scoring 10-under and 8-under respectively. Third place was a tie between Hideto Tanihara and Akihito Yokoyama at 5-under.
Handa founded the Japan Blind Golf Association, the first such club in Japan, in 1988, and is known as “the father of blind golf in Japan.” The ISPS regularly sponsors blind golf tournaments.
In addition to ISPS, Handa is also the chairman of the International Foundation for Arts and Culture (IFAC), which has held international concerts in Tokyo featuring famous singers and musicians such as David Foster, former Chicago vocalist Peter Cetera and many others, including Grammy Award winners. The IFAC also holds the International High School Arts Festival every year, which sees the foundation give awards to artwork created by Japanese and foreign high school students in the spirit of nurturing future artists.
He is also the chairman of the Tokyo Art Foundation that organizes various concerts and plays.
On the philanthropic front, Handa is the chairman of Worldwide Support for Development, which holds a variety of summit meetings on world welfare. Most recently, the WSD held a symposium in March in which it invited former U.S. President Barack Obama to discuss denuclearization, world peace and other subjects.
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