Yearly Archives: 2021

There has been a hint in the forecasts that we could be in for a couple of days of summer and there were plenty of short sleeves out in support of that idea today. Things remained reasonably pleasant if you could stay in the deep shade but when needs must venture into the open sun, you could tell that the day was just a bit on the warm side. So, with light air and firm fairways, it was to be expected that there would be some good scoring to be had. We almost had only twenty players on the course after Michael’s Mum lead him astray last night but, after Blighty pulled the pin, Michael decided that he had better make the effort to make the numbers twenty one. And, then, there was Ben’s mate Atila. And no, he is not a Hun. But he is over from Adelaide which could make him sort of Hunnish.

On the basis of his round today, Jason has a new nickname – Handbrake Hopkins. He absolutely slaughtered the front nine, carding only 2 over the par, for a massive 24 points. He flirted briefly with repeating the performance on the back but then jammed on the handbrake to produce a relatively paltry sixteen points over the back nine to post the winning score for the day of forty points. “Dirty Harry” was heard to mutter “Make my day!”

“Old Reliable” continued with his (don’t say boring!) habit of whacking them down the centre of the fairway to be not far behind Jason in the scoring stakes on the front nine. Unfortunately, Craig was not able to take advantage on the back and also only managed to score sixteen points to finish still three points behind the leader at the end of the day.

Zimmer had to zimm off after the round so there was not much of a fix on his game generally but, with a fair scattering of three pointers, he was able to match his handicap on the day. Targe teed off with his pink ball today and managed to survive at least one and a half holes with it. He won’t have to worry about the suggestion that the pink ball will require playing in the first group in a pink tutu, at least for this week, with his third placing. Porks also had an ‘average’ round to join in on the third place points.

Brendon had his moments today, and you could have been forgiven for thinking that he was protecting his handicap with some of the uncharacteristic ‘chunky’ shots that he played at times. On the 14th, nobody could catch the flight of his tee-shot other than it went high and so a precautionary provisional was taken. As it turned out, the ball was found quite easily, about a metre from the penalty pond. The scoreline of 35 points was good enough to nab fourth place on his Pat Malone.

Michael came in slightly less hungover than he was at the start and opined that his score of 34 points would probably be good enough to snare a share of fifth place. And he was right. He ‘staggered’ to the podium alongside Gordon (heavily handicapped by a monstrous gold medal), Adam, Damo and Bob.

The first BallPin today was on the 7th hole and, luckily, the tees were placed not too far back giving more of a chance to all. Targe had ‘discarded’ the pink ball by this stage and he did not come up at all short to leave his tee shot inside a couple of metres and pin high. With an eminently gettable birdie putt for five points, the pressure was really on and, in the end, it was a four for only three points. The second BallPin was on the 18th, as usual, and there were any number of smiley faces on the chit. The one that counted, however, was that for Porks and for some reason he had a sad face. Maybe it was due to the fact that he didn’t make the birdie. The one name on the chit that did get the birdie was Ben, which bagged him four points (out of nine on the back) and a place along with nine others who also bagged birdies on the day.

Atila made a valiant effort to snare the Jackpot ProPin on the 15th but he didn’t account for Craig who, with the smell of money in his nostrils, smacked it to 1.6m to collect the big dollars. He made sure that he, too, was in the Birdie Brigade.

The trees came in for a fair amount of comment today. Ben’s group spent a fair amount of time searching for his ball after at least fourteen close encounters of the timber kind. Simon ‘promised’ to come in to fell the tree on the 4th after it ‘got in the way’ and spoiled his enjoyment of playing the hole for the last time. Harry absolutely ‘creamed’ his second shot on the first, only to have it dead-centre the only ball sized branch for miles that happened to be anywhere near the desired flight path.

Simon was careful today to avoid getting into any bunkers as he wants to save that ‘pleasure’ for his new track on Bribie Island. Damo wasn’t quite so lucky and found the sand by the green on the 6th. Not being one to hold back, Damo gave it a fair bit. Gordon, standing across the green behind the pin was sprayed with sand but swears that the ball did not come out with the sand. Despite a thorough search the ball could not be found. Damo reckons the ball must have buried itself into the face of the bunker.

JQ had hopes for an Eagle on the 9th today after his ball ‘split the pin’ just a little too hard and ricocheted off at ninety degrees to leave him with a couple of putts for his par. Trev was the only one who owned up to a draughtie today but according to all reports it could almost qualify as a ‘trick shot’. Seems the ball went straight up and virtually landed back onto the tee peg.

It is the time of year that we have to start thinking about a couple of things. The Annual General Meeting of the Club is scheduled for 6th March and all positions on the Committee will be up for grabs. So, the incumbents should be thinking about succession planning if they plan not to continue in their current role. Club members should be lobbying for support if there is a role that they would like to take on. Doesn’t matter if it is already occupied, a bit of competition never goes astray.

March also marks the start of the Matchplay Championship. There is a Registration Form on the website under the Player Registration. Could everybody please use the form to indicate whether or not they wish to be included in the seeding for the event. If you have any doubts as to whether you can comply with the playing requirements due to work, travel etc etc, please register NO so that we can minimise the use of the ‘Walkover’ result. The draw for seedings (1 to 36 and 1 plays 36, etc – not for opponents) will be done after the round on 27th February.

Results for Saturday, 09 January 2021
1st Jason Hopkins(40) 2nd Craig Cameron(37) 3rd Kazim Akdag(36) 3rd Targe Mifsud(36) 3rd Ryan Porker(36) 4th Brendon Mitchell(35) 5th Michael Gourlay(34) 5th Gordon Hill(34) 5th Adam King(34) 5th Damien Lee(34) 5th Bob McDonald(34)

Seniors Results: 1st Craig Cameron (37) 2nd Targe Mifsud (36) 3rd Bob McDonald (34) 3rd Gordon Hill (34) 3rd Michael Gourlay (34)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin15th Craig Cameron BallPin No 1 7th Targe Mifsud BallPin No 2 18th Ryan Porker

There is an old saying – Make hay while the sun shines, make love while it rains. And the sun was shining today, so it was probably a good opportunity to make some hay because who knows what the next few weeks might bring. The pessimists view is that restrictions will be brought back into play and who knows how that might affect our ability to continue sledging one another mercilessly each and every Saturday. The BOM was forecasting some chance of rain so watch out girls in it does happen to materialise. Pepsi managed to get back into the state before the isolation requirements kicked in, and so he was able to play today. Noodles was suffering from a ‘tinder’ back (or so Brendon said) and he was a late scratching which meant that we ended up with a field of 16 for the first of the 2021 trophies, the January Monthly Medal.

Brendon was his usual methodical self today and barely put a foot wrong the whole round. There was a moment of the 9th when his second finished just off the path under the big elm by the 18th. An impeding stone was blamed for the pop shot into the garden bed. There was some frantic searching to find the ball in the clumpy grass and Craig saved the day by finding it and allowing the free drop. Still, a double bogie wasn’t too bad a result and the final result of a net 62 was more than enough to collect the top spot and the Medal.

Zimmer was asking before tee time why he wasn’t on double figures yet. The score card at the end of the round shows the reason why with no less than three birdies on the front nine. Jason was doing a pretty fine job of making a round of it, but he reckons he ‘hit the wall’ three holes from home and a double and a triple certainly did not help the cause. MattH played a fine hand on the front to plod just two over par and a slight relaxation on the back caused him to join Zimmer and Jason in second place with their score of 67.

Craig (aka “Old Reliable”) just kept smacking them straight up the middle and taking great delight in the amount of run that he was getting from the harder summer ground. He did have a modicum of luck on the 8th when he pulled off a ‘cannon off the bush’ to bring the ball closer in to the green. Porks was supposed to have had a case of the shanks today but that did not stop him from playing to his handicap and tying up with Craig in 3rd place.

Part way through the round Stan said he was going OK except for a couple of holes. The double figures on the 6th was probably one of those holes but, all in all, a result one outside your handicap is nothing to be ashamed of. Pepsi might well have been still suffering from his extended time behind the wheel, but he managed to join up with Stan in fourth place. Last in the field of point-getters with a net score of 70 was Michael who brought up the rear in more ways than one.

There was a ball up for grabs with the first BallPin on the 4th hole. The first group through succeeded in placing the marker on the green and the rest of the field could get no closer than MattH. The same pretty much applied for the BallPin on the 18th except that it was Damo who shut out the rest of the field. The ProPin was on the 15th and the pickings had been pretty slim until the fourth group when Jason managed to get it on. Unfortunately, the distance was 5.1m, so it was a case of close, but no cigar and there will be a Jackpot for next week. You could have been forgiven for thinking that the money was on the 12th after Brendon put his tee shot to a metre and a half. He rattled in the birdie with the greatest of ease and contributed to the total of 16 that we managed for the day.

There were a couple of highlights in Harry’s game today, like the chips in on the 8th and the 16th. Then again, there were some low-lights like a complete stymie at the base of a tree on the 11th and OOB by a centimetre on the 15th. Stef had received news that his bank account had been hacked, and he was on the phone to his bank manager. With the phone jammed between his shoulder and his ear, it was Stef’s turn to putt. Which he did, one handed, and sank the putt from three metres or more. Not once, but twice. On the other hand, he had missed a few from one metre using both hands earlier on. Damo was planning to play it safe on the 13th, after several recent dices with the penalty area on the left of the fairway, by using his 3-wood rather than his driver. Zimmer gave him a razzing for being a wuss and, rising to the bait, Damo pulled out his driver and promptly hit the hazard. He was quickly followed into the same trap by none other than Zimmer and his mate Stef. I think it is called karma.

There has been a good response to payment of subs, but there are still a few outstanding. We don’t mind if you want to put off paying for a bit, but we really would like to know what your intentions are. Just drop an email to Harry, Noodles and Gordon so that we can keep our records in order. Those members with GolfLink membership with us who did not advise before the deadline have had their membership deactivated.

Results for Saturday, 02 January 2021
1st Brendon Mitchell(62) 2nd Kazim Akdag(67) 2nd Jason Hopkins(67) 2nd Matt Hunt(67) 3rd Craig Cameron(68) 3rd Ryan Porker(68) 4th Stan Blackshaw(69) 4th Andrew Petricola(69) 5th Michael Gourlay(70)

Seniors Results: 1st Craig Cameron (68) 2nd Stan Blackshaw (69) 3rd Michael Gourlay (70)

Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin15th Jackpot BallPin No 1 4th Matt Hunt BallPin No 2 18th Damien Lee