Another beautiful day in paradise. The ground-staff are doing their darnedest to compensate for the rainfall that isn’t coming even to the extent of leaving the greens saturated right up until play starts. The casual water does add some interest on greens that might otherwise be uninteresting. There were some concerns that the long week-end would lure some members away. And it did. But, there were still twenty-six who made it to the course and with the addition of one visitor, Papa, there was a field of 27 set out. Only 25 completed the round, Ed aggravated a hamstring and Joe had a zoo to go to (after he finished his matchplay match).
The cricket season is over and that saw a couple of the aficionados of that particular ball sport fronting back up for the ‘tween seasons break. Only one of the cricketers was successful though and that was Damo who started off with a front nine that did not look all that promising. Perhaps he was just lulling Keith into a false sense of security in their match as, after the turn, it turned into a demonstration with a one under scoreline returning 22 points to give the winning total of 37. In the process, he left Keith in the dust to take the match 4 and 2.
Usually, the stableford points calculations are pretty well done, but occasionally people forget that their handicap has changed and they claim a point where they shouldn’t or they don’t claim one when they should. This seems to have happened in two cases today and as a result there was a bit of a turn-around in the results from the after game run-down. Now, in second place, with 36 points is none other than Chrispy. Perhaps it was the thought of the draughties presented by Jake and Papa and the prospect of needing to call Uber to get home that caused him to miss a point (or to forget about the shanks).
On the other hand Mal took one where he shouldn’t and so he dropped back to share third place with Harry, MattH, and David on 35. Harry started out well enough in his effort to get on top of Ed in their match but after a certain amount of chest beating and eye gouging, Ed retired himself after seven holes with his aggravated hamstring. Harry was two ahead at the time. Matt took a couple of holes to get going and then strung quite a few together but he got the shakes a bit on the back, possibly a result of SOS going close to taking Jason out with one of his shanks, which he seems to have caught from Chris the other week. David showed that he is a definite contender in a driving contest with Stef. He decided to ‘lay up’ on the 14th and managed to finish pin-high as a result.
John was heavily embroiled in his match with Rob who wanted it made clear that he played with fifteen stitches in his back but he didn’t pull out. There wasn’t much in the match by and large although John did retain the upper hand for most of the round. He might have thought of reaching for the Butter Menthols as Rob brought it back to square at the 17th but a win on the 18th gave the match to John 1 up. Allan gave a very good impression of an early morning milk delivery van as he jiggled around the course on his trusty gopher. There was certainly potential on the card for a bit of improvement and Allan could very soon present further up the podium than he did today. Jason also left a few out there with one gash and a sprinkling of singletons offering promise of better things to come and maybe an even lower handicap yet.
The BallPin today was on the 4th and Joe was the only one to worry the pin at all. Even though it was reasonably close to the mark, he did not make the birdie On the 15ht, Harry put his to 3.8m, just about spot on Dave’s estimate from the tee of 12ft, to take out a ProPin for the second week in a row. He also did not make the birdie. The fixed ProPin on the 18th was a bit more of a contest but it was eventually taken out by Damo with a distance of 1.78m. Damo didn’t make the birdie but the other contender, Dale did get his birdie from 4.6m and in so doing he contributed to the total of 16 for the day. Porks, the Nest Raider of the Lost Ark, played the 6th like a violin and after a driver and fairway wood to a metre or so, slotted the putt to collect the eggs on offer.
However, the eagle on the 6th did nothing much for Ryan in his match against the Beast in which the Beast was never really headed and the match finished 4 and 3. The result could have been entirely different when Bill went OOB on the 14th. But, rather than lay up and play it safe, Ryan went for it and he too went OOB handing another win to Bill. Targe and Brendon also matched up today and the long and short of it is that Targe fought back valiantly from being 4 in arrears to finish the round all square and so they, and an appreciative audience, lined up for a chip-off to determine the result. The first pair of chips were ordinary to say the least and the putting ended up still square. Second time around, Brendon got close enough to make it hard for Targe and he ended up winning the match. Noodles said to Joe that if Joe finished the round with clubs in his bag he would win the match. This proved to be prophetic as Joe did finish with clubs in his bag and he did win the match 5 and 3.
Simon cracked it today. No, he didn’t do his ‘nana. He dropped his puffer and it no longer ‘puffs’ and his good mates were disappointed to find him dragging on darts after the round. Dennis was having a bit of a bad day and he expressed his disappointment at not being able to lose the ball he was playing with even when he hit it out of bounds. After being urged to keep the game moving along to catch the group in front, Allan did nothing for the cause by arriving on the 7th tee with his putter firmly in hand. Gordon spilled a lot of oil from the sump on the back nine after racking up 26 points in 11 holes. He went on to make 31 for the whole round. Jason was having a fine time with his wedge and chipped in twice from some distance out. All that mid-week practice must be paying off.
The AGM was held after the round and a good number of members stayed around to take part. The minutes of the meeting will be circulated in due course. Suffice it to say that there are not a lot of changes to the committee line-up. MattN will take the role of Tee Marshal and will be assisted as required by John and Simon. The Priems boys will assist Gordon in the role of Social Secretary. Ten Year Awards are due to Ed Kloprogge, Rod Grant, John Quinlan and Mehmet Akdag and these will be presented on a suitable occasion.
The Annual Challenge is coming up in October and it is still possible to register if you speak nicely to Gordon. Gordon will be circulating more details shortly.
Next week is the first round of the Stuart Clarke Memorial event. Two rounds of Stableford. Come along and remember Stuart. There’ll be a bar-be-que after the second round.
Results for Saturday, 10 March 2018
1st Damien Lee(37) 2nd Chris Priems(36) 3rd Harry Boughen(35) 3rd Malcolm Fleming(35) 3rd Matt Hunt(35) 3rd David Mullenger(35) 4th Allan Davies(34) 4th John Quinlan(34) 5th Jason Hopkins(33)
Seniors Results: 1st Harry Boughen (35) 1st Malcolm Fleming (35) 2nd Allan Davies (34) 3rd Keith Delzoppo (32)
Nearest the Pin Results: ProPin No 1 15th Harry Boughen ProPin No 2 18th Damien Lee BallPin 4th Joe Wagenecht
Eagle’s nest Results: Eagle 5th Ryan Porker