Da conditions were good on 14 March 2020.

You could be forgiven for thinking that the autumn break was upon us after the sudden change in the weather yesterday. There were a few spots of rain over night and the breeze out of the south made a few of the less hardy souls among us bring out the jumpers and other warm apparel. But, there were also some hardier types that soldiered out in their shorts and sleeves. There was lots of talk about viruses and toilet paper and cigarettes (or lack of them – good onya Damo) and it seemed that all twenty one players were on deck with the full intent of meaning business. That is until Ben stepped onto the first tee. Well, everybody thought that he meant business with his first swing in the vicinity of the ball. The point in question relates to whether it was a practice swing or not. But, enough of that little episode. There are bigger fish to fry.

Last week, the scoring was all of a cluster and we had a four way countback for the medal that eventually had to go to the last three holes to separate the final pair. If it had been a Medal or a Major this week, there would have been no need for such computational gymnastics because Peter played well outside himself and came home with a +6. The new GA system applies a one stroke penalty if you break by seven so maybe our winners penalty is not so severe after all.

Chrispy seems to be settling into his new found role in the Seniors and that was helped no end by playing with a couple of other seniors in Dennis and Si who gave him a few lessons in the fine art of ‘senior’ sledging. As usual, he made good use of his skills as a tree marshal to keep his ball in play and to help himself to a bottom line of +4. He did say that the ankle was a bit antsy after the round but he is confident that he will be back for the next two weeks to collect the trophy for the Stuart Clarke memorial.

Blighty was working on being a CAD during the week and that might explain his sure and steady progress through the round with the barest smattering of holes on the ‘wrong’ side of the ledger. He teamed up in second place with Enzo who was anxious to get away early and it seems that the anxiety got to Enzo as the game deteriorated as the round progressed with a slump from +4 on the front to a -2 on the back for an overall result of +2.

Jake took a while to warm up, possibly because he was in unfamiliar territory with a group of Seniors. Some of his drives sailed a long way straight down the centre of the fairway so he obviously hasn’t been taking lesson from his Dad. The apprentice tree marshal seems to have managed to stay out of them, mostly, today and Dennis joined Jake on the fourth podium with a score of +1. There was something of a gap to fifth place where Brendon, ChrisV and Whitey crowded together (despite the risk of virus) to collect the single point for a score of -2.

The ProPin today was a Jackpot on the 4th and the tree on the left played the usual amount of havoc with shots to the green. Harry’s ball just clipped some low hanging leaves to take just a smidgen of pace off the ball and have it run close by the hole to finish 4.11m past. At the end of the day, that was enough to collect the loot. The first BallPin was on the 12th and it was a fiercely contested event. First, Brendon eased out Enzo. Damo shot his past the pin and it spun back to finish a metre or so closer. Then Blighty repeated the dose and spun his back from above the pin to come out the winner. On the 18th, the BallPin was effectively a no contest when Chrispy put his to a metre or so to shut the rest of the field out. Disappointingly, he didn’t make the birdie and so our total for the day was another, fairly paltry, tally of five.

There were two matches contested today which means that the first round is now half complete. Three more weeks to get it done so those remaining had better get organising. Anyway, ChrisV and Damo were first cabs off the rank and both had a shaky start, finding the trees on the right of the first. The fortunes fluctuated a bit and they both seemed intent on not getting too far ahead at any stage. Despite the to-ing and fro-ing Chris managed to get to three up with five holes to go. Out of bounds on the 14th and 15th gave Damo a sniff of a chance which he took and won the next two holes as well to be one up on the 18th. ” I’m going to sink this (long) putt”, said Chris. “As if”, said Damo. And he did. To win the hole. Leading to a chip-off to decide the match. It took three, pretty scrappy, chipping rounds before Damo could be declared the winner.

Blighty and Whitey were the other valiant duo to do battle. And, quite a battle it was with four holes passing before there was a break either way. Blighty snagged a couple on the trot and the match up was so close that it took some time for the score to be clawed back to square. But, Blighty kept his nerve and never got behind to make the match dormie after the 16th. He then delivered the coup de grace with a birdie on the 17th to take the match 3 and 1. Despite the closeness of the match, there was nary a cross word between the two of them the whole round and they were even heard to be complimenting one another on the execution of their shots

Dale, it seems, was somewhat tempted by the prospect of winning a ball or the inside NTP on the 18th but the shot did no go quite to plan. The most accurate estimate seems to be that the ball moved a total of 22cm. This surely qualifies as a draughtie even if we discount Ben’s swishing on the first. Simon came up short on the 12th and his usually exemplary chipping skills also failed him as the first was still short of the green. The second was going a million miles an hour when it hit the pin dead centre, stopped dead and dropped into the hole for an unlikely par. Porks and Noodles have a bit of a thing going and Noods reckons Porks can’t beat him despite a shot on the 8th that was heading out of bounds until it also hit the flag-stick dead centre and stopped on the green. Damo had a bad case of the ‘wimps’ today trying to ‘baby’ the ball into the hole and being completely bamboozled by the break.

After the formalities, the AGM of the Club was held. Outgoing President, John, thanked everybody for the support given to him and for the enjoyment that he had leading the Club these last few years. The Treasurer reported that the Club is in a sound financial position with a profit of $581 last financial year and a current bank balance of $2782. There was a vote of thanks to SOS for his efforts and good wishes for his upcoming surgery that will see him out of circulation for some time. The new Committee was elected with the changes being Rob Priems (President), Damien Lee (Vice president), Stephen Butterfield (Treasurer) and Matt Hunt (Club Captain). A full Committee list will be posted on the web-site.

Our first Major for this calendar year is coming up over the next two weeks for the Stuart Clarke Memorial. A great chance to boost your Championship chances with a double dose of points on offer. As usual there will be a bar-be-que after the second round so, if nothing else, you will be in line for a good feed.