General News
6 December, 2025
‘White Knights’
THE future of Chalambar Golf Club is looking a lot brighter with a new proposal for a private company to take over parts of the club’s operations and return it to financial stability. A meeting of club members on Monday was briefed on the new rescue package involving former resident Adam Haddow and his husband Michael Combes. Club administrator Rebecca Hindson said the new proposal is a point of celebration.
“If you recall when we were first called up by the board to come here the association was hopelessly insolvent. At that point, we became the administrators some months later and we quickly turned that around with the staff’s help to become profitable.
“Our goal was to always to maintain this as a golf and bowls club going forward.
Ms Hindson outlined the new proposal to members by Mr Haddow and Michael Combs.
“We’re not selling off the golf course and we’re not selling off the assets within the club and we’re not selling off gaming, the responsibility for gaming will still rest with the board.
“Santa Clause has certainly delivered,” she said.
Mr Haddow and Mr Coombes have established a new company Mad Golf Pty Ltd.
Their business will vastly refurbish and extend the club and its range of services.
Their plans include a complete revamp of the clubrooms, dining area and gaming room.
“Our ambition is to partner with you to make this place go from great to amazing,” Mr Haddow said.
“We want the golf club to become one of the premier locations in Victoria if not Australia for golfing and food and beverage.
“We already have a great golf course, there needs to be some investment in the golf course itself,” he said.
“We think that the dining component is critical. We think there should be more outdoor dining. We need to have a casual bar, it should be an amazing place to come after golf and there needs to be a friendly restaurant dealing with everything from breakfast to dinner.”
Mr Haddow also outlined a vision for a 40 room hotel on the site which he believes will draw visitation and economic activity to Ararat.
“We do think in the short and medium term we will renovate the golf club, the club rooms and golf course, and in the medium to long term it’s to build a 40 room boutique hotel as an offering for stay and play and event based activities at the club,” Mr Haddow said.
Club members will vote on the proposal on Monday the 22nd of December.
Ms Hindson if members agree, she hopes the new deal will be in place by late February.
In more positive news, Ms Hindson said creditors will get 100 cents in the dollar owed to them and confirmed the administrators have also been able to reduce the GST owing to the Australian Taxation Office by $165,000 and have been able to reduce the money owed to GWMWater by $54,000.
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