The 36-hole event at Waratah Golf Club runs over two days and Smith will start as one of the firm favourites.

The 20-year-old will be aiming for a hat-trick of titles this weekend, which would place the right-hander among Toronto's US PGA Tour member Nathan Green (four) and Waratah's reigning NSW Open champion, Leigh McKechnie (three), in dominating the 58-year-old tournament.

Smith returned from the US on August 6 after spending six weeks playing four amateur tournaments, the Northeast Amateur, Dogwood Invitational, Player's Amateur and Southern Amateur.

He made the cut once, at the Northeast Amateur, in Rumford, in Maine, when he finished equal 59th with a 15-over 291.

Smith was meant to play the Porter Cup at the Niagara Falls Country Club but withdrew because of illness.

"I played just terrible really, it wasn't the best trip but you learn from it and it's time to move on and I'm doing that," he said. "I played OK in the first event [Northeast Amateur] and it just started to go downhill from there, I just couldn't get anything going."

Smith said that after the US disappointment he was ecstatic to be in the familiar surrounds of the Belmont Golf Course yesterday practising for the WE Alexander Open.

"It's probably one of the biggest tournaments we've got, other than the Lake Macquarie Amateur, and it has a lot of history behind it," he said of the WE Alexander, which began in 1952 as a 36-hole contest for Hunter professionals and leading NSW amateurs in honour of Bill Alexander, who was Waratah president from 1927 to 1951.

Smith will mark his 21st birthday on October 2 by turning professional.

He is lining up invitations for the Western Australian Open, WA PGA, NSW PGA and NSW Open and hopes to target the One Asian Tour events until September next year, when he will head to Europe or the US.

"They just don't have the money in Australia in the four-round tournaments, so it's good they have a new tour and they're putting on more events next year," Smith said.

"They should have at least 15 to 20 next year with over a million-dollar purse, which would be very nice."