The prospect of sausages and burger patties was obviously enough the attract a couple of players who weren’t able to make it last week and despite some of the scores from last week, the majority of the first-timers showed as well. The weather was definitely much kinder this time around and the warm spell and no further rain allowed to course to dry out and the greens were generally voted as being on the slick side. This didn’t seem to make a lot of difference to the chance for birdies though as there were 14 reported including at least one by the Beast who continues to improve his tally in the eclectic. He’ll just about have to start working on the eagles from now on though as there aren’t too many of the smaller fry left.
Well, the lead was there to defend, and defend it he did. Whitey suffered a bit of a downturn after last weeks sterling effort but still came home with a respectable enough -2 to end the double round with a +4. All he has to do now is to extract the silverware from the grasp of his mate Dick and bring it in so that the Committee can arrange to get it suitable engraved for posterity. In the meantime he will just have to be satisfied with his name in lights in the Hall of Fame.
Ed reckons he worked out what he was doing wrong with the scoring on the 6th and got it right this week. He was square (score not attitude) this week and rolled into second place just behind Whitey with +3. This collected him a fair swag of points in both Championship tables without too much damage to his handicap. Why is nobody surprised?
A bit of a gap then to third place that was filled by Harry who managed a couple of ones over the two weeks – one down and one up to finish the event just nicely square. If not for several three putt greens, there could have been quite a different story to write today. Maybe the name of the game should be changed to ifonly.
Bob started the round with a putt on the first that hit the rim of the cup and did a 180 before finishing a couple of inches out. You can imagine the sort of response that elicited. Just think of the same sort of thing happening several times more during the round. Oh, the ifonlies! Still a pair of -1 isn’t too bad a result and that was shared by ChrisV who seems to have settled into his new handicap nicely and continues to gather a few points.
Last, but by no means least on the podium for this event was Mehm and Damo with a couple of -3. Mehm was steady with a square today but Damo reckons he was feeling the pressure of his five (5) handicap when, at one stage, he was one over par but 2 down.
The other event today was the Bonus Trophy of a round of golf for four people with carts and a beer afterwards. And the winner was – Blighty. Andrew came in with a +2 which was the best score for the day and so all he has to do now is find three mates (two non-club members) to share the luxuries provided courtesy of the Course Management. There is an expiry date, so don’t dilly-dally.
There was one Matchplay match contested today. Bill the Beast was back on deck for the first time since the grease and oil-change on his knee and lined up against Pepsi who was down on one of his visits from the Sin City. Pepsi was victorious 2 and 1 but in no way can Bill blame the reworking of his knee. Apparently, it was Pepsi chipping in on at least two occasions and then having a ball that was heading for the Yarra hit a tree and bounce back into play that really broke the camel’s back. Talk about Kill Bill.
Speaking of (cl)assy shots, Brendon skinnied a wedge from behind the hazard on the 17th that also looked to be heading for Dights Falls when it also hit a tree right on the fence-line and bounced back to just off the green. A chip and a putt sealed the par. Go figure.
Gordo managed to put his drive on the 12th onto the green close enough to win himself a ball in the Nearest the Pin. Now, it seems that as Gordo was addressing the ball to putt, it moved by some other means (wind, gravity etc etc) and Gordon applied a penalty as used to be the case in these circumstances. However, there has been an exception added to Rule 18.2b whereby, if it is known or virtually certain that the movement was not due to any action of the player, the ball can be played from the new location with no penalty. A small consolation for Gordo that his round was not quite as disastrous but not enough to change any result. The 18th proved to be too hard to reach today and the ProPin was not collected so a Jackpot again next week. This is getting to be a bit regular but Pepsi does not think there will be enough in it to justify him coming back from Sydney next week.
It’s amazing the conversations that go on. Chrispy opining that he was thinking of buying a sports bra? Mehm being nice during the round because Oliver was in his group?
Gordon had to rush off to get down the Coast somewhere to prepare for a half-marathon or something similar tomorrow. Lets hope its out and back and that he doesn’t need to run back to the start. The Birthday Birdie hopes that he doesn’t wear himself out too much to have a bit of a celebration during the week. Happy Birthday Mr President but Marilyn won’t be available.
Don’t forget about the June Best Three competition. All you have to do is ante up $10 and play at least three of the four weeks in June to be eligible to win a very nice tour bag for the best tally of Stableford points (Par scores converted) posted in the month of June
Results for Saturday, 17 May 2014
1st Rodney White(+6, -2, +4) 2nd Ed Kloprogge(+3, □, +3) 3rd Harry Boughen(-1, +1, □) 4th Bob McDonald(-1, -1, -2) 4th Chris Vinecombe(-1,-1 -2) 5th Mehmet Akdag(-3, □, -3) 5th Damien Lee(+1, -4, -3)