Next Week’s Details

The weatherman promised hot, and, when the northerly started to pick up, the temperature rose pretty smartly. Always a good time to keep yourself well hydrated, and to make as much shade as possible with a good hat and an umbrella. Plus, don’t forget the sunscreen. Fifteen members sweated it out (should have been sixteen, but somebody didn’t get out of bed, or something) and, despite plenty of run on the dryer back fairways, the scoring was not great in the long run, but we did manage to rack up ten birdies between us. Harry spent a bit of time playing in outback New South Wales, and the drying conditions are starting to remind him of the course at Bourke, where the cracks could be wide enough to swallow your ball. Fortunately, ours aren’t quite that wide – yet!

Perhaps it was the increasing temperature, but there were some pretty flash front nines that were not replicated on the back. Harry started off with a par on the first, and managed three more before reaching the turn two up. The oil leak, that started on the ninth, eventually took up on the 15th, and he finished with a burst, spoiled only by the par putt on the 18th ricocheting off the pin and spinning out of the hole. Still, a square card was enough to win the day.

Pepsi blamed Harry for leading him astray on the last with the comment that the pin was on the top deck when the NTP box was put out. However, it was now on the bottom deck, and the loss on the hole cost Pepsi a share of first place. I guess the ground staff can do what they like, provided that none of the field have gone through that part of the course yet. It does make it a bit tough for those that like to check some of the pin positions before the round.

Marc continued his love affair with the Ivanhoe trees today, and put in a very good showing for his first round of official competition. JQ had a bit of a discussion with Porks about his ‘longest drive ever’ on the 13th, and Ryan dutifully played the shorter ball. Except that his was actually the longer ball, and he had played JQ’s ball. JQ then played from the shorter spot to the edge of the green, and calmly rolled in the long shot putt for a birdie. This brought him home on -2 alongside Marc in second place. Then comes a cast of thousands in fourth place, which would surely have Michael asking if this was some sort of a record. No less than seven members crowded onto the podium, having carded minus four for their round. Raj had the best of the front nine with a plus three at the turn. He thought he had minus eight on the back, but a slight error in his handicap brought that back to minus seven, and he thus managed to squeeze into fifth beside Targe. The two members who missed out on points were not too far behind.

The Jackpot BallPin on the 7th was won by Gordo. Porks squeezed out Bob for the BallPin on the 18th, and ‘just’ beat Harry for the Inside ProPin by about 8m. The fourth hole beat us all again, and there will be a Double Jackpot on the little blighter next week. Should be getting to be almost worth winning, or even dividing, if push comes to shove.

A couple of events to note. Marc had a birthday last week, so the Birthday Birdie says – hope it was a good one. Pepsi played his 700th game with the club and went close to celebrating with a win. SOS went sniffing around the internet and scored himself a bargain for a new set of irons. Driver from the first went a bit right. New iron headed in the direction of the green. New wedge balanced delicately between the pin and the hole edge. Voice from behind – Anybody using a SOS ball? Oops, not a birdie after all. Bob is back on deck after an extended time off, and looking in fine fettle. He was so busy filling everybody in on his various ‘misfortunes’ that he forgot to strap down his bag, and it parted company from his buggy on its way down the hill at the first. The eagle had a couple of nervous moments today. Gordo left his second shot on the third about 75 mm left of the hole, and Porks rimmed the cup on the 8th with his second shot, with the ball finishing teetering on the edge of the hole.

The Committee met today to deal with a few matters in the lead up to the AGM. Because of some earlier rescheduling of the calendar, it was agreed to postpone the AGM from the usual spot associated with the Stuart Clarke Memorial to the date of the April Monthly Medal (05 April). It was also determined that there would be a barbecue lunch on that day as well. The draw was done for the Matchplay seeding and the new results table has been posted on the website under Competitions. Just remember, if you and your opponent play the same day, you play your match, but you do have an option not to, if it happens to be a Major or the Priems Cup.

Results for Saturday, 22 Feb 2025
1st Harry Boughen (□) 2nd Andrew Petricola (-1) 3rd Marc Phillips (-2) 3rd John Quinlan (-2) 4th Stan Blackshaw (-3) 4th Craig Cameron (-3) 4th Steven Gervasoni (-3) 4th Gordon Hill (-3) 4th Bob McDonald (-3) 4th Ryan Porker (-3) 4th Robert Priems (-3) 5th Rajesh Mahto (-4) 5th Targe Mifsud (-4)

Seniors Results: 1st Harry Boughen (□) 2nd Bob McDonald (-3) 2nd Craig Cameron (-3) 2nd Gordon Hill (-3) 2nd Robert Priems (-3) 2nd Stan Blackshaw (-3) 2nd Steven Gervasoni (-3) 3rd Targe Mifsud (-4)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin – 4th Jackpot BallPin No 1 – 7th Gordon Hill BallPin No 2 – 18th Ryan Porker

Your blog writer, a non-playing spectator, arrived as Stan was walking between the 13th green and 14th tee.

“How’s it going Stan?” I asked.

“Just plodding, nothing special” said Stan with a poker face but a suspicious glint in his eye.

In fact Stan had just had 4 consecutive 3-pointers on holes 10-13 and after 18 points on the front 9, he was on fire!

The poker face of course was to not put the mozz on himself and while cooling off a fraction, Stan stayed steady, finished with a solid 3-point par on the 18th and his 40 points was a clear winner on the day.

Three lengths behind in second was Adam on 37 points, who finished strongly with 4 pars, including a miraculous par on 16 with a monster putt.

He then hit a great shot into the 18th to 2.14 metres, which was easily good enough to win the nearest-the-pin ball.

Nobody hit the 7th green, so the NTP ball there jackpots. As does the money of the 4th.

Third placed Porks first par of the day came on the third where he took his trusty Callaway driving iron off the tee. Nice solid swing saw the ball fly down the middle about 200 metres. Unfortunately, the clubhead also decided to take flight, doing a McIlroy/Gervasoni trick. It will be headed off to the pro-shop for some expensive surgery to reunite with the shaft during the week.

Kenny had two wipes and a 1-pointer on the front 9 but still managed 20 points (you do the maths on his other 6 holes). But he couldn’t sustain the pace and had to settle for 4th with 33 points.

Along the way, apart from surging to the lead in the Eclectic, Ken won the bravest shot of the day award. After hitting his drive into the hazard on the right hand side of the 13th and looking at an awkward stance and the ball in deep grass, he faced one of those moments of golf decision-making “I probably should take an unplayable, but stuff it, I’ll have a crack and see if I can hit it out”. And he did, beautifully, big swing with a wedge, huge divot, ball flew out a good 50 metres through the trees and on to the fairway from where Ken calmly collected 2 points for the hole.

Trick shot of the day went to Steve Gervasoni. Full-shot into the first he managed to clip the top of the ball in such a way that the ball went backwards. As Craig his playing partner noted, “some effort that!”

Two blokes got 5th place points with 29, but really, anybody that accepts a point with that score shouldn’t have their names mentioned, especially the bloke now leading both the Cub and Seniors Championship and the thing Harry calls the Order of Merit (and I call Ivanhoe World Golf Rankings). His round this week was 13 shots worse than last week. Funny game golf.

Rob was out of the points but went home with more new balls than the winner. He hit it into the pond on 17 and went fishing, finding 5 balls, but not his own.

Special mention to our Club Captain Brendon for setting a new club record, only bloke to come NAGA or joint-NAGA (with Targe on 27) on the occasion of his 500th game with the club. Congratulations Brendon on 500.

Congratulations also to new member Marc Phillips who completed his third card today and now has a club handicap – joining Kenny on 28. Welcome and good luck Marc, hope to see you in the points soon. PS. The way new handicaps get calculated on your first 3 cards, any score over a double bogey is adjusted down to a double bogey, so say Marc if you had an 11 on the 6th today, that gets counted as 7, the 8 on the 10th counted as a 6 etc. Calculated that way, your three rounds came in as 95, 96, 97, average of 96 = 28.

I never check birthdays, so if you had one last week or one coming up this week, Harry will bake your cake when he’s back next week.

700+ words today, sorry. I blame Kenny and Porks for the fun stories. And CJ. And Marc. And Brendon. Maybe Stan, Adam, Raj, Targe, Craig, Steve, Rob also. Not to mention Harry for having a week off!

Next week it is a Par comp with your committee having a meeting after the round. Amongst other business, we’ll review the club’s finances and formally “pass” the 2024 financial report so our ever efficient Club Secretary Craig can complete all the “Annual Statement” material required of our “incorporated association” government regulator, Consumer Affairs Victoria (CAV). They are kind of like our tax department. There’s official stuff, including financial reports, that we have to do for them every year.

Big thanks as always to Craig and our Treasurers over recent years, SoS and Gordo, and everybody else on the committee for doing the necessary behind the scenes work to keep the club ticking along, including making sure all the CAV requirements get done.

Results for Saturday, 15 Feb 2025
1st Stan Blackshaw (40) 2nd Adam King (37) 3rd Ryan Porker (34) 4th Ken Watson (33) 5th Rajesh Mahto (29) 5th Chris Priems (29)

Seniors Results: 1st Stan Blackshaw (40) 2nd Ken Watson (33) 3rd Chris Priems (29)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin – 4th Jackpot BallPin No 1 – 7th Jackpot BallPin No 2 – 18th Adam King

CJ. CJ. CJ. CJ. Actually, he wasn’t the only player on the course. There were thirteen other members and our ‘intern’, Marc, who turned out to do battle with the vagaries of the rapidly desiccating fairways at Ivanhoe. It’s starting to remind some members of some of the outback courses that they have played in the past. The cracks don’t quite come up to the standard of Bourke, where your ball could easily disappear, but some are getting there. The weather was fine and overcast with little wind, so some good scoring was definitely on the cards (or not, depending on how your game went).

So, after honing his skills at the Frog yesterday, CJ came out, and started taking the course apart, and in the process produced a personal best score of 69 off the stick for a total of 44 Stableford points. And he had the hide to say that he left a few out there, which you have to believe, when he three-putted from less than half a metre on one hole. Harry looked as if he was going to match CJ when he turned with 20 points also. However, he couldn’t quite match the ‘Power of the Priems’ on the back, and could only manage another seventeen points to collect second place with 37 points.

Brent tried for a draw on the 11th but pulled it into the trees instead, and the ball came rocketing back to finish pretty much in line with the red markers. Despite that, he managed to par the hole to finish with a commendable 35 points. Stan declared that there wasn’t anything exciting about his game other than making it to 4.3m from the hole on the 15th to take out the ProPin for the day. But, he also scored 35 points to take a share of third place. Raj was much happier today than he was last week, and his score of 34 points won him fourth place. Porks also claimed an unexciting round, other than having to avoid Brent’s drive on the second, on his way to the last spot on the podium with thirty-three.

The first BallPin was on the 12th, and Brent managed to get closest to take out that one. He did miss the putt by a whisker, so that hole did not contribute to the ten that we scored for the day. The BallPin on the 18th was a Double Jackpot, and it was left to Harry to knock off JQ for the booty.

Marc lined up for a lesson with Chris during the week, so his head was full of good advice. He played some great shots, and the errant ones made good use of the trees. His drive from the 2nd went through a tree and still finished in the bunker on the 6th, which could easily be a first. Brendon was a bit down the batting order today, and at one stage he was reduced to using the back of his putter to play a shot. Harry, on the other hand, was able to extricate himself using the face of the club. SOS was cheesed when the HIO comp on the 18th informed him that it was only available between 1359 and 1459, so, at least, it saved him money. Brendon, on the other hand, scored some freebies by reporting faults with the system. Adam went to ‘clink’ tinnies with CJ to celebrate his win, and CJ thought Adam had bought him another, and tried to take it. The Birthday Birdie has a big shout out today for Bob and Brent, who both have reason to celebrate this week.

Results for Saturday, 08 Feb 2025
1st Chris Priems (44) 2nd Harry Boughen (37) 3rd Stan Blackshaw (35) 3rd Brent Rowley (35) 4th Rajesh Mahto (34) 5th Ryan Porker (33)

Seniors Results: 1st Chris Priems (44) 2nd Harry Boughen (37) 3rd Stan Blackshaw (35)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin – 15th Stan Blackshaw BallPin No 1 – 12th Brent Rowley BallPin No 2 – 18th Harry Boughen

Beautiful fine weather. Hard fairways. Soft (and freshly blown) greens. High scoring in recent weeks. Eleven keen members. Our old mate, Snags. Guest (and potential new member) Marc Phillips. There was every promise of a day to remember on the scoring front. And the reality?

SOS owned up to the fact that he has had a couple of lessons with Chris (Moore, that is, not the other one(s)), and he reckons that he can put his Bradbury like performance down to that. Watch out everyone, because he is lining up for more, and recommending it to anyone who will listen. Do I smell ‘commission’? So, by doing a bit of a blitz job on the back, he was able to thread his way through the tumbling ten-pins to finish on top with everybody’s favourite, sixty-nine to collect the Medal, and a place in the David Primrose.

CJ made good use of the trees today, and was saved, on a number of occasions, by appeals to the tree gods, who promptly answered his supplications. His final score was just a stroke behind the winner thanks to the numerous interventions. It was thought that, maybe, Marc also had a direct line to aforesaid tree gods when a number of stray shots turned fortuitous.

Craig was his usual sure and steady self, and could easily have been better than seventy-one, except for a couple of strayings from the straight and narrow. The pars proved elusive for Stan, who joined Craig in third place. Appearing a little more regularly in recent times seems to be paying off for Ken, who featured in the points again to take a couple for fourth place. Rounding out the podium, we had Ryan, who also tried for a Bradbury, by polishing off the back nine just one stroke over the card. Just a pity he couldn’t have been a bit higher up the table to mark the occasion of his 400th game with the Club.

There was a thought that the BallPin on the 7th was a chance to Jackpot again, but Old Reliable had other ideas, and put it on and close enough to add another pair of balls to his collection. Nobody was so lucky on the 18th, and there will be a Double Jackpot next week, with three balls to be won. The ProPin was set on the 4th, and the 5m circle almost proved to be too small, but Gordo saved the day by getting his ball to 2.97m. The birdie eluded him, which was not atypical, as we could only card three for the day.

Raj gave his ankle a good work out today, as he was seen to be taking the ‘scenic route’, on a few occasions. He also admitted donating three balls to the collection at the bottom of the pond on the 17th. Not quite a record, but getting up there. Snags didn’t have any coins with him today because it all goes into his ‘swear box’ at home. Or, should that be, ‘swear 200l drum’. The Birthday Birdie was remiss and missed Rob’s big day a couple of weeks ago, and there is a big shout out due to Josh in the coming week.

Results for Saturday, 01 Feb 2025
1st Stephen O’Sullivan (69) 2nd Chris Priems (70) 3rd Stan Blackshaw (71) 3rd Craig Cameron (71) 4th Ken Watson (73) 5th Dan Marie (74) 5th Ryan Porker (74)

Seniors Results: 1st Chris Priems (70) 2nd Craig Cameron (71) 2nd Stan Blackshaw (71) 3rd Ken Watson (73)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin – 4th Gordon Hill BallPin No 1 – 7th Craig Cameron BallPin No 2 – 18th Jackpot