Weather was kind but the holes were in the wrong places and even the greens on some holes!!
However, some players found everything to their liking. It’s easy to run up a cricket score if you got into a tight spot as many players found out. The greens were rather slow due to not having been cut for today but I’m sure Dukes greens will be better next week.
Next Wednesday is round 2 on Dukes so we must all pray for good conditions with no rain on the day. Scores will be joined with todays scores. Both Net and gross.
Well done to those having good score.

Clouds melted to give a sunny and fresher day than of late for the President’s Putter. Good turnout of 62 considering NAPGC commitments of some and peak holiday season.

As with last week, women featured strongly on the leaderboard with 3 in the top 4 positions; the winner on countback with 41 points was Igor Lanzargorte from Caroline Stilwell. Igor steady on both 9s but an excellent front 9 – 23 points including birdie and NTP at 2^nd (see further below re prizes)  from Caroline. Next on 40 points was Avi Murphy – truly excellent and Avi shares the front 9 honours with Caroline. Reiko Hashimoto was the next woman on 39 points. 5 shared 38 points with Peter Harrison the leader on countback from Tony Kopczak, Alex Catlow, Ben Dickey and Tom Simpkins. A mention for Chris Mellish who had 5 birdies outweighed by 7 ‘blobs’.

Our President not present but 7 novelty prizes as below – and note Ray’s eagle a 9^th– well done indeed! 2^nd men’s eagle at the hole this year and 9 so far recorded [see attached] . Well done Goran for 2 prizes!

Hole     

2             NTP                       Caroline Stillwell

4             NTP                       Alex Catlow

9             NTP in 3               Ray Esin (in hole – Eagle!)

11           NTP                       Goran Kovacevic

13           NTP                       Kenny Du

16           NTP                       George Taylor

18           NTP in 2               Goran Kovacevic

For the men this was 5^th To Dog competition and by division:

Senior: Will Balakrishnan leads 28 pts from Alan K 20 with Kerry and Ben 16

Junior:Gunnar Sundberg still leads 18 from Richard Inglis 16 and then a chasing pack of 4 on 12.

Each of us was given a set of 7 clubs including a driver and a putter and it was definitely a struggle for most. Perhaps sending us home with a greater regard for the players of yesteryear. Especially when combined with less forgiving clothing and courses that probably in comparison make RP look to be fantastic.

More images can be found on https://www.richmondparkgolfclub.org.uk/2024-people-and-events/ eventually videos will also be uploaded.

Of course there was one amongst us for whom the day didn’t seem to present that much of a challenge & that despite one of his 4-ball trying to take him out with a whack on the back of his head. Huge congratulations to Richard Smith for his amazing 38 points and comfortable 7 point margin for the win.
To encourage midweek & green fee payers to participate, the club offered a concessionary rate and the 2 5-day players made the most of this offer. In 2nd spot on 31 points was Bill Norman with Giles Rawlinson being the better of the 4 on 28 points to take 3rd place.

It is a fact that the back 9 generally plays a lot easier than the front 9 (the 7th & 8th were again the 2 hardest holes for everyone) and today there were some spectacular differences. Partly no doubt as we were getting more used to the clubs.
Despite the generally low scoring there were 12 birdies amongst the group. Richard Owen’s on the 2nd was no doubt the most impressive after his tee shot left him in a very grassy spot on the back of the bunker on the left. A spectacular chip sent it through the air and into the hole, but alas not winning one of the NTP prizes

And finally it was lovely to see Jon Cooper today who was the organiser of our hickory event 10 years ago and hopefully the NHS can get him back playing.

The day started with light rain but as predicted became dry and pleasant.
Scoring was generally good with over half the field scoring 30+.
Colin Price was out to beat his own age but apparently missed out by one, howver he topped the scoring with a sparkling 42 points. Wishing he had entered the sweep!!
Tom Simpkins , Chris Rudkin and Richard Marriott all scored 40 points but Tom came second on countback with Richard 3rd. Ed Robinson just pipped Bridget Stone both on 36 points. Well done Bridget being the leading lady.
A mention about Ian Burgess who scored a 4 on the 4th hole for 4 points. Must be his lucky number!
Jeremy Prescot got a 2 on the 10th for 4 points.

A very warm day for the Diamond Jubilee.

A fine 66 off 19 earned David Grace the trophy; some excellent rounds from 2 women followed – Pat Barbour 69 and Doreen Dolby 70 – well done ladies! Peter Harrison and George Taylor followed with 70s beaten on countback with George dropping just 1 shot on front 9. New club champion Will Balakrishnan took back 9 honours of 37 (1 over)
This was 3rd of 5 Jubilees in the Anniversary Cup and with his 73 today Gunnar Sundberg has stablished a 2 shot lead on 220 from Mike Assender and Paul Kamerling.

A good turnout of 67.

The day on Prince’s started sunny and became clouded, but dry – perfect conditions for good results, if it were not for the treacherous high grass ‘eating’ balls, which led to a number of unfortunate NRs. 😉

The competition was held in 2 Divisions, with the majority of players starting in the higher handicap Division 2.

Gina, playing off 11, came in first in Division 1, with a net result of 67, which could have been even better if she hadn’t run into problems with the par3s on the second 9.

Peter Miller won Division 2 with an even better result of net 66, playing off 29.

Women

A sunnier day than forecast and so much quicker than last Sunday’s round. All we needed was some good rounds of golf. to complete it. As is normal, the cards tend to show one or two holes being the undoing of several potentially good scores
Bridget won by 4 shots on a net 67 from Doreen on 71 (on countback). All of us, bar Reiko, were there when she decried her abilities, ignoring her 3 pars and 3 bogeys which based on her handicap gave her 8 shots to use up elsewhere. WHS agrees she played very well and is awarding a 1.1 cut tomorrow to her handicap.

Holes 7 & 8 as may be expected came out as the hardest holes today.

Men

A glorious 65 earned Kerry Sargeant the winning score for the senior division; Kerry started as he finished with birdies and kept a six off his card. A remarkable and consistent 66 earned Richard Smith second place – including an eagle at 14th (the 4th by men on Sundays this year per attached). George Taylor and Michael Hayden followed wit excellent 66s. The in-form Richard Inglis NRd but alaso eagled the 14th – well done!

A fine 64 in late game by Charlie Whiteman won the junior division. A skilful back 9 37 placed Peter Harrison 2nd on 66; a super back 9 from Ian Burgess earned a countback 67 win from Alan King who also had super back 9.

This was 6th round od the Grand Medal (5th in July abandoned) and we see in the senior division Kerry leading 277 just 1 ahead of Richard both 4 rounds played; in the junior division Nigel Ward has a 21 shot lead on 354 from Ian Burgess 375; Nigel built solid foundation with early 3 rounds in the 60s.

On an initially rainy, but then rapidly improving Saturday, 10 women and 10 men met to fight for the Bontor women vs. men trophy, which was last year won by the women.

The format is always singles matchplay and, after starting with the ladies’ and the gentlemen’s respective captains against each other in the first group, the other 9 pairs followed in handicap order.

Here are the results in the order the pairs came in:

• Cheryl Woodhouse (20 shots) vs. Uli Katte : Cheryl won on the last hole
• Sheena Harrington (7 shots) vs. Mike Assender: Mike won 2&1
• Katharina Katte (7 shots) vs. Robert Carlyle: Rob won 6&5
• Jayne Maxwell (7 shots) vs. Richard Inglis: Jayne won 2&1
• Susan Smith (4 shots) vs. Rannesh Jansari: draw
• Lia Donath (6 shots) vs. Gerard Ouattara: Lia won
• Joan Mulcahy (6 shots) vs. Sean O’Sullivan: Sean won
• Alison Chadwick vs. Alex Braun: Alex won
• Sali Davies vs. Tom Laybourn: Sali won 4&2
• Deborah Potter (6 shots) vs. Cliff Morgan: Deborah won 3&1

This gives the women an 5.5 / 4.5 win over the men!
Congratulations to Cheryl and her team!!

After the match there was pizza and chips and drinks and chat and gossip and banter … 🙂

Thanks everyone for this very enjoyable, yet competitive, golf day around the ‘battle of the sexes’!

Cheers,
Uli & Cheryl