Golfers take to the ice in the Svalbards

British golfer John Wells held off fierce competition to claim the 2004 Drambuie World Ice Golf Championship held earlier this month on the Norwegian Svalbard Islands.

Playing on a course cut into snow and ice and in temperatures reaching -20 C., Wells ended the two-day tournament with a 12-over par. The top female finisher was golf pro Nicole Materne of the U.S., who finished tied for 10th overall at 24-over par.

“Conditions today were both difficult and brutal. It’s survival of the fittest out there and this week I was the fittest,” Wells said.

The Drambuie World Ice Golf Championship is now in its fifth year and moved location from Greenland, the original home of the tournament, to Svalbard in 2004.