Pictured from right to left: LET Honorary Member Roland Specker with Player President Helen Alfredsson and Board Member Michael Siebold.
The Ladies European Tour is pleased to announce that German businessman Roland Specker has accepted Honorary Membership of the organisation after nearly 12 years of service as a Non-Executive Director on the Board of Directors.
Specker, who built and sold a successful investment counselling and property business before serving on the LET Board from 2004-2016, was involved in major strategic decision making, with his main area of focus being The Solheim Cup.
Specker will become the first male Honorary Member of the LET and the third in total, joining Louise Solheim, who was bestowed Honorary Membership in September 2011 in recognition of her contribution to the Tour as a founder of The Solheim Cup and Helena Alterby Nordström, the Chairman of the LET from 2013-2016.
Current Chairman, Mark Lichtenhein, said: “On behalf of the Ladies European Tour, I would like to express our gratitude to Roland for his outstanding commitment and I am delighted to name him as an Honorary Member, in appreciation of his valuable service and contribution.”
During Specker’s service to the tour, he was involved in developing The Solheim Cup into the greatest women’s professional golf event in the world, where teams from Europe and USA compete bi-annually in a tournament identical to the highly successful Ryder Cup. He was also personally influential in bringing the tournament to Germany in 2015, resulting in the first ever live broadcast coverage of golf on national television in the country.
The event received enormous media and television coverage not only in Europe and the USA, but across the globe. He also worked on the impressive bidding process for The 2019 Solheim Cup, won by Scotland.
LET CEO Ivan Khodabakhsh commented: “I would like to pay special thanks to Roland for his valuable support and advice over the last 12 years and for his vision and hard work, which helped to ensure the great success of both The 2015 Solheim Cup in Germany and the bid for The 2019 Solheim Cup, which will be played in the Home of Golf, attracting a huge audience and media profile for the Tour and the host country.”
Specker said: “It was a great pleasure for me to work on the LET Board for more than 11 years. We went through tough times and now I’m very proud to be made an Honorary Member of the Tour. I’m very thankful and I wish the LET all the best for the future.”
According to the LET Members’ Regulations, the Board of Directors retains sole responsibility for invitation to Honorary Membership that may be awarded in recognition of great service to the Ladies European Tour or to the world of golf in general. Honorary Members are not Full Members and therefore there is no requirement to have been Female at Birth.
