Yearly Archives: 2019

Where the bloody hell were you? Yes, there had been a bit of rain. Yes, it was a bit on the cool side. Yes, it was a Par event. But, was that any reason for only 14 players to turn up to front the tee marshalls and try their hand at taming the beast that is Ivanhoe Public Golf Course in winter. The rain has significantly softened most of the course and in some places more than others. The course management have seen fit to declare that preferred lies are the order of the day and, although the greens were not swept clean, they were soft enough to attack, provided that you had a bit of elevation going for you. So, all in all, no reason not to score well.

Despite most things being in favour of making a good score, it was left to one person to, literally, take the course apart. And, while he was at it, he did a good job of it, carding a 71 off the stick for a personal best on the course. The round included two birdies, which was a major proportion of those scored on the day with only one other for a fairly ordinary total of three of the little feathery buggers. While in the process of putting together his tally of +8, Porks also managed an absolute demolition of JQ in the semi-final of the matchplay. John, didn’t play all that badly, but in the face of the all-conquering Ryan, he stood little chance before succumbing 8 and 7 in a no strokes (or quarter) given match. Ironically, after it was all over, JQ actually won a couple of holes.

Whitey was pretty happy with his front nine which he finished one up. The next nine started well enough but he had heard that Porks was doing well and perhaps this preyed on his mind and a mini slump in results ensued. Undeterred, the scoring rate picked up again and, by the end of the round the card was all square which was enough to score second place for the day. At one stage, to play a ‘safe’ shot, Whitey pulled out his trusty putter and managed to get the ball high enough to flirt with the tree canopy and to carry about 100m. Can’t get much ‘safer’ than that.

Dennis, of recent hole-in-one fame, reckons he almost did it again today. The green in question was the 16th. Now, before you get all excited, the tee shot was from the 14th. Still, that didn’t stop Dennis from coming home just the one point below the square line to gather the points for third place. Targe thought he should have been up there with Dennis. However, Targe didn’t manage to print off the Handicap Sheet this week and so he didn’t notice that his handicap was actually 25 and not 26. As a result, Targe had to share 4th place with Gordon, who is back from hob-nobbing with the Pros over in the US of A. Lastly, but not leastly, Noodles rounded out the rather small tally of point scorers in fifth place.

The Nearest the Pin competition today started on the 7th for the first of the BallPin events. It was quite a day to select this particular hole (SOS) because the tee markers were about as far back as they could be without being in the penalty area behind. Anyhow, Chrispy managed to keep one straight enough (or got a good enough ricochet off a tree) to get it onto the green, unchallenged, for a ball. The ProPin was on the 12th and it was up to Noodles to collect that one with a shot to 4.02m. There was a bit more of a contest for the ball on the 18th and, proving that the hole is a bit of a favourite of his, Dennis managed to squeeze one close enough to collect the ball, if not another HIO.

Brendon had a few moments today and was keen to know which holes were the BallPin so that he could win back some of the balls that he lost. After the drive drifted OOB on the 14th, Bren spent an inordinate amount of time searching and managed to turn up a ball that was deemed to be a bocce kitty and not a golf ball. His drive on the 9th found the autumn leaf piles under the tree on the left and, despite removal of loose impediments and preferred lie, the leaves still impacted the second shot which hit the nearby mesh drain guard and the ball finished barely advanced from whence it started.

While on the subject of preferred lie, Targe reckons he is at a disadvantage because of his smaller hands. Perhaps he should be mindful of what else they reckon you can tell about a bloke from the size of his hands! Chrispy has been known to go looking for good trees to help his game. Well, after today he is apparently going to be looking for good roots as well. Simon was not too pleased with his result today but, gentleman that he is, he always returns the crockery to the kitchen after he has supped his cup of tea. However, today, he didn’t quite make it to the kitchen when his good intentions ended in disaster and there was a serious crockery smash on the club-house floor. The ladies in the kitchen will surely forgive you, Si!

Results for Saturday, 15 June 2019
1st Ryan Porker(+8) 2nd Rodney White(□) 3rd Dennis Ward(-1) 4th Gordon Hill(-2) 4th Targe Mifsud(-2) 5th Stephen Butterfield(-3)

Seniors Results: 1st Dennis Ward (-1) 2nd Gordon Hill (-2) 2nd Targe Mifsud (-2) 3rd Harry Boughen (-4)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin12th Stephen Butterfield BallPin No 1 7th Chris Priems BallPin No 2 18th Dennis Ward

There were a number of factors that could have affected play today. There were the celebrations to mark the 75th anniversary of D-day. There was the women’s semi-final at the French Open. There were the celebrations to mark the Queen’s birthday. There was the rather frigid conditions that didn’t really start to ameliorate until about three parts of the way through the round. And there was the new competition format to be played – Sableford. Perhaps the latter explains why nobody in the field was able to play to their handicap today – read, was able to break their handicap. Once the sun did manage to get above the horizon and the bit of cloud burnt away, it really was quite a nice day. Absolutely no reason why 21 members and two guests shouldn’t have played their pants off.

Adam hasn’t been with us for long but the early ‘goss’ was that it would not be too long before he presented to the judges and today proved that to be the case. The current ‘goss’ has it that he missed a few putts today as well, so this might not be the last. Brendon, on the other hand hit the ball a couple of times more than appeared on his card as he showed off his incredible skill at deciding that the ball wasn’t going to go far enough and hitting it again with the same swing. Not just the once, but twice. Luckily for Brendon, under the new rules, they only counted as one shot on each occasion. Nobody is sure why he chose to put his tee-shot from the 17th onto the 18th green but he reckons he played to have his second shot rattle into the pedestrian barrier at the back of the green and stay safely in bounds. Thirty five points got the pair the eight points and just the winners penalty off the handicap for next week.

When Targe made the announcements, he thought that he was on the second podium spot on his ownsome. What he hadn’t accounted for was the inability of SOS and Jason to add up and so, in the end, he had to share the second spot but he gets just a many points so he is probably not too worried. He was certainly pleased to see that Harry didn’t have such a good day at the office today. SOS on the other hand is perfectly happy with the temporary green on the 3rd because, today, he managed to birdie it. The celebrations at the time could be heard quite widely and he did contribute to the rather small total of 5 birdies for the day.

The promotion of SOS did ease the crowding on the third step with Jason Simon and Whitey not having to cuddle up too close. That is more than can be said for the last step Noodles, Big Joe and Ken having to schmooze together to make room for Rod who managed to forget that he had two strokes on the 13th, of all holes, and got promoted into fifth place as a result.

The nearest the Pin competitions saw the ProPin being contended for on the 12th and Peter and Harry started the ball rolling with only millimetres separating the two distances from the hole. But in the end, it was all for naught as Brendon whacked his to 2.28m to take home the dosh. The first BallPin on the 15th was won by Whitey while the 18th went uncontested to Simon.

One of our guests today was Joe Demir who was a member a number of years back and he has now decided to make a comeback. So welcome back Joe. Because of the elapsed time and a lack of a current GA handicap, Joe will be putting in his three cards and if today’s is any guide, his old handicap would not have been a good place for him to restart. He has obviously been getting some practice somewhere.

There were two draughties today. Bob scored on on the 15th and Targe managed one on the 14th with a poorly executed cover drive that barely made it across the path beside the 14th tee. Also there were a couple of shots that Dennis defined as FIST shots (F*** it’s still there). Big Joe managed a woolly woofer on the 13th tee while Trev did manage to make contact with the ball but only moved it about 25mm in the process.

There were a few problems with trees out there today. Harry caught the trees on the second and finished on the first green. After being urged by SOS to have a sh*t, the ball was struck cleanly and caught branches not quite cleanly enough to come back and finish on the green again. Ken was placed behind a tree between the 13th and the 10th. His chip caught the tree flush, the ball ran up the trunk, arced over his head and finished about 2m behind where it started. Ben’s ball had obviously heard about last weeks marathon and was so determined not to suffer a similar fate that it tried hiding behind a tree. Ben didn’t realise that there were preferred lies available today and played it as it lay. Pays to check the signage, hey Ben.

Allan had a couple of moments today. On the 16th, he took three putts from a metre from the hole and they were all a metre long. Then he was spotted pushing Thunderbird up the path from the 18th green (assisted by Adam) since the electrons had ceased to flow from the battery to the motor. It was later discovered that the key had been turned off!

Results for Saturday, 08 June 2019
1st Adam King(35) 1st Brendon Mitchell(35) 2nd Targe Mifsud(34) 2nd Stephen O’Sullivan(34) 3rd Simon Powell(33) 3rd Brent Rowley(33) 4th Peter Damou(32) 4th Jason Hopkins(32) 4th Dennis Ward(32) 4th Rodney White(32) 5th Stephen Butterfield(31) 5th Rod Grant(31) 5th Joe Wagenecht(31) 5th Ken Watson(31)

Seniors Results: 1st Targe Mifsud (34) 2nd Simon Powell (33) 3rd Dennis Ward (32)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin12th Brendon Mitchell BallPin No 1 15th Joe Wagenecht BallPin No 2 18th Simon Powell

Of the twenty one members who turned up today, you would reckon that the one that you could trust would be a copper. But no, when entrusted with putting out the Nearest the Pin markers, Matt wasn’t able to get just about anything right although not all of it might have been his fault. The Grand Pooh Bah swears that he labelled the containers according to his selection but that did not reflect what was delivered to Matt’s ‘safe’ hands. So, there was no BallPin on the 7th, as many expected, and the ProPin was forgotten at the 15th. But more of that later. The day was overcast and calm, the course had softened a little as a result of the recent rain and there was little reason why scoring should not have been good, if not easy.

As it turned out, the goodest that anybody could do was to play to their handicap and the man that was able to do that, despite taking a few cuts in recent weeks was our Pepsi who managed to do the round in three over the course par, exactly matching his handicap to take out the June Monthly Medal. Pepsi has been steadily working his way up the Championship Table and if he can keep up this run of form he could be right in the thick of it by the end of the year.

The next cab off the rank was filled by Mehmet who made a big thing of the fact that he has not played much in recent times and that talent will show through despite the lack of practice. Dale joined Mehm on the podium and could be forgiven for being a bit crooked on Chrispy for potentially costing him the medal. It seems that Dale was putting for an almost certain birdie on the 4th when Chris dropped his ball, that finished near to the hole, at a critical stage of the back-swing. The missed putt avoided the need for a count-back, which, as it turned out, Dale would have lost anyway but the extra points would have been nice. Thanks Chrispy – not.

JQ came in next after a very steady round with nothing great but nothing disastrous either. This probably stood him in good stead as he was locked in serious battle with Ben in their quarter final match. The match was close to being an off-the-stick affair with only three strokes to be given. A very even start was followed by a bit of a surge from Ben and he gained a fairly handy lead of two up after five holes. Something of a slump in the middle third swung the match into JQ’s favour but Ben managed to sink some 10m putts to win the ‘unwinnable’ holes and at the 16th he had a slight advantage on the card.

Then came the 17th. Faced with a side-hill pitch across the penalty area to the green, Ben put the first into the water. Then the second. Then the third. After seven balls in the water, he hit out sideways and carded a 19 for the hole. This leaves intact, for the time being, Mehmet’s record of 22 strokes on the same hole. Needless to say, Ben lost the hole and the match went to the 18th all square. Both were on the green but Ben needed three putts while JQ needed only two and so the match went JQ’s way, 1 up.

Noodles and ‘Forgetful’ both scored 73 to take home fourth place. Noodles didn’t seem too happy about his lot after nearly being taken out by incoming as he trudged up the 13th while playing the 10th. Would have put him out of his misery he reckoned. A broken club, for unspecified reasons, would probably not have helped either. Harry, Adam and Bob managed to get a point apiece for their 74s. Bob put his second into the penalty area on the left of the 13th and had a blind shot over the trees for his trouble. No trouble for Bobbie though as he put it onto the green not far from the pin for an easy putt and a very respectable five.

Now, back to the Nearest the Pin competitions. The BallPin on the 12th, which might or might not have been in the right place, was a hard fought battle that was eventually taken out by Ken. He made the birdie, and in doing so he scored 20% of the total for the day. The BallPin on the 18th was in its correct place but it ended up being controversial because of a decision to ‘separate’ this event from the deferred ProPin. Long story, short version, Bob collected the ball. The ProPin went to Ben with a shot to about 4m and that probably went some way to compensating for the cost of balls on the 17th (and the loss of the match).

David wasn’t present today so the Birthday Birdie will have to flutter off to wish him one of the best for today.

The Priems boys sure know how to look after one another. Chrispy managed to score himself a draughtie on the second despite the white markers being not too far back on the dam(n) wall. Just so that he didn’t feel too bad about having to shout, Rob lined up on the third and returned the favour. Peter had a fair bit of strife with the trees today. And it started early. Approaching the 1st green from just through the tree line on the 10th, Peter got the spotted gum square and almost took his own head off as the ball whizzed back further out into the middle of the 10th. The next shot caught the same tree, though not quite as flush this time. The miscellaneous other stymies and ball between roots don’t bear mentioning.

Allan and Thunderbird were spotted a bit off track and in the depression to the right of the 9th tee rather than on the path provided. Allan’s story was that there are sometimes frogs in there and he thought he might find some. It would probably help if there was actually water in the ‘pond’. Chrispy still reckons that we should consider cutting the round back to eleven holes. However, this week, he wants it to be the last eleven holes. Maybe we should just settle on the eleven best and be done with it.

Blighty was back on deck today looking pretty hale and hearty after the little scare of a few weeks back. Michael has reported that his knee is giving him curry and it is likely to be a few weeks yet before he starts his tilt at toppling the Seniors leaderboard.

Results for Saturday, 01 June 2019
1st Andrew Petricola(68) 2nd Mehmet Akdag(69) 2nd Dale Webb(69) 3rd John Quinlan(71) 4th Stephen Butterfield(73) 4th Matt Hunt(73) 5th Harry Boughen(74) 5th Adam King(74) 5th Bob McDonald(74)

Seniors Results: 1st Bob McDonald (74) 1st Harry Boughen (74) 2nd Allan Davies (76) 2nd Andrew Blight (76) 3rd Targe Mifsud (82)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin18th Ben Akdag BallPin No 1 12th Ken Watson BallPin No 2 18th Bob McDonald

The weather bureau is predicting a week of rain, of which we are sore in need. Fortunately, the suggestion was for later in the day today and that has proved to be correct. And so, the seventeen members and one guest were blessed with fine conditions and quite balmy temperatures once the morning chill had been banished by the sun. With lots of extra points in the offing from the GrandPar format the field was hopeful of some decent scores.

As it turned out, the winner for the day was not in need of double or triple points, instead relying on the good old fashioned singletons to come in with a score line of +5. After the front nine, Harry was ruing some squandered chances but from the turn, it all fell into place and a personal best equalling tally of 37 off the stick and +6 points would put a smile on anybody’s face. Harry has a feeling that back-to-back Monthly Medals might be off the agenda but you always live in hope.

Noodles was in the same group as Harry and, as the back nine progressed he seemed to be getting more and more anxious about his own position. This might or might not have contributed to a tapering of the scoring in the second half. He did have the benefit of one of the two pointers and it went awfully close to being a three pointer. The hole in question was the 3rd and, after a very nice drive, the chip stopped, agonisingly, a few centimetres short of the hole. The birdie was almost a foregone conclusion and that contributed to the rather small total of six for the day. The two pointers only tallied four so the birdies must have mostly been on the easier holes. Still, Noodles was happy with the points and more than happy to leave the winners penalty to Harry.

Then, there was the rest of the field. Matt would have been reasonably happy with his front nine but, after the turn the pluses struggled to eventuate and the round ended up being pretty balanced with an overall square result. Chrispy is still struggling a bit with load carrying capacity of his ankle and he reckons that we should shorten our competitions to eleven holes at which point the soreness starts to really hit. Things didn’t look too good on the 17th as it appeared that Chris was going to drive his cart into the penalty area, perhaps to commit some bizarre form of hara-kiri. But, he did manage to bring in a square card and share the honours on the third place podium with Matt.

It was Targe’s birthday today and he was in receipt of a few slaps on the back when he finally arrived. Apparently Targe always has a drink with a mate on his birthday and the tradition continued on the way to golf today. Targe did say that it was a bit spooky among the tombstones in the dark. The nip of whatever he had didn’t seem to affect his game too much and he collected a couple of points for his -1. Whitey was able to match that, despite having loaned a driver, that Noodles had given him, back to Noodles. As an aside, Noods reckons he loves it and doesn’t know why he gave it away.

The last podium step was just a little crowded with Allan, Ryan and Brent trying to maintain a toehold without having to get too close and personal with the rest.

The Nearest the Pin competition today was a repeat of last week as the Grand Pooh Bah Tee Marshall couldn’t be bothered changing the labels. The first BallPin on the 4th was, seemingly, a tough call and the chit had to wait for Whitey to come along and put his name on it. The second BallPin on the 18th had a couple of contenders pacing it out to determine who was closest. In the end it was Harry who got the nod. The inside ProPin was so far unclaimed and so out came the tape-measure for an official record. The distance reached the end of the tape and Harry marked the spot with his finger. Peter let the end of the tape go and the auto retract kicked in and the edge of the tape went close to amputating the tip of the carefully placed finger. The ProShop will probably be wondering about the bloodstains on the card. Simon was anxiously asking everybody if they had managed to knock him off for our ProPin on the 12th and he was suitably deflated when Brent came in with a measurement of 3.95m.

Matt Nicholls managed to drag himself away from the sunny climes of Cairns and joined us for a round today and he freely admitted that he had not played golf since last he was here. And it showed. He might have had a draughtie on the 3rd though there was some question about exactly how far into the long stuff the ball might have penetrated. The second shot could easily have suffered a similar fate were it not for a tree that returned the ball to the fairway. A fair dinkum airie on the 5th and another miss from a stymie later in the round did not help the cause. Targe also had a near miss on a hole where the blue and red markers were effectively co-incident. It was a bit of a struggle but the ball did get past the red markers.

Ken also had some problems with trees today with one well struck shot, that happened to catch a tree dead centre, finishing some 20 metres behind where he started. On the other hand, the GOATee reckons he has been showing his admiration for the Grand Pooh Bah by using the trees to good effect to keep his ball in play. Michael was back on the tee this morning and was enquiring as to how many points he has to accumulate to catch the leaders in the Seniors. Unfortunately, he developed a knee problem severe enough to stop him playing the last two holes so his lunge for the leadership will have to wait at least another week.

Results for Saturday, 25 May 2019
1st Harry Boughen(+5) 2nd Stephen Butterfield(+4) 3rd Matt Hunt(□) 3rd Chris Priems(□) 4th Targe Mifsud(-1) 4th Rodney White(-1) 5th Allan Davies(-2) 5th Ryan Porker(-2) 5th Brent Rowley(-2)

Seniors Results: 1st Harry Boughen (+5) 2nd Targe Mifsud (-1) 3rd Allan Davies (-2)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin12th Brent Rowley BallPin No 1 4th Rodney White BallPin No 2 18th Harry Boughen

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