Who would have bet on there being snow this morning leading to a lot of no-shows or cancellations.

With the very much reduced field and the early guys suffering the worst of the weather the comp has been changed to a sweep. We may have re-introduced the 2-putt rule for the temps but they were very much a lottery today and along with the 4 temps, the 10th was almost unplayable with standing water around half of the hole.

With most of the tees playing from the red positions, arguably the men’s scores should also have been off the red rather than yellow, but it was a non-qualifier and the only woman who played was not in contention off any tee!

Winner today with a very commendable 34 points was Andy, followed by Giles on 32 and Iain, Alex & Kim on 30.

Women

Winter conditions duly arrived today with a return to the mud and 2 temporary greens. There is likely to be a PCC (Playing Conditions Calculation) adjustment overnight since only 3 of the men managed to play to par or better and for sure none of the women did.
Cheryl looks to have spent her time off the course well bouncing back with her 29 today to win by 2 from Nida who was ready to call it a day after 11 but came to life after that.
Good to see some of our newer members at the top of the list and hope that today’s conditions haven’t put them off too much.
An analysis of the results shows that between us we managed to record a whole 7 pars and 1 glorious birdie 2 on the 10th from Ellie.
This was the first of what should be 4 rounds of the Duke’s eclectic, however, there are just 4 with counting scores at present as everyone else picked up on one of more holes.

Men

Conditions = ‘Wintry’

Div 1
Winner was Laurence Armstrong (10), 20 out 18 in, for a superb 38 points. In second came Chris Mellish (09), 17 out and 20 in, one point behind on 37. Third was Suhail Salim on 35 points, fourth Mark Bean on the same score.

Div 2
Winner was Dan Ballantyne (15), 20 out and 17 in, for a excellent 37 points. In second came Richard Posser (15), 17 out and 17 in, for 34 points. Duncan Taylor came in third on 33 points.

Shout out to Gerrard for his birdie on the 12th.

The weather was kinder than forecast earlier in the week, with no rain but chilly conditions. There were very slow rounds for some of the later groups, probably due to the ‘medal’ format and ball searching amongst the leaves. Thankfully the vast majority of the competitions over the next few months will be stableford.

In Division 1 there was a trio of players who played to their handicap (net 68) with Peppe winning the monthly medal spirits crystal glass on countback from Alan Treacy and Richard Smith, respectively. Richard had the best front and back 9s and the lowest gross score overall.

In Division 2 the winner was Chris Rudkin with the best net score of the day (net 65), followed by Stephen Philbin on net 68 and Kim Jabbour & Peter Harrington, both on net 71.

A bright sunny day for the Charity Cup – and dry with a breeze.
Winner by 2 points was Richard Prosser with a skilful 39 points – and sharing front 9 honours of 21 with Jonathan Evans and Paul Green. Second with 37 was Joe Goncalves. Another good round from Paul Kamerling earned Paul 3rd place on countback from Lawrence Armstrong – both on 36 points.
Best back 9 was Gregory Jean-Baptiste on 20 points and best woman Jayne Maxwell 32.

Duke’s generally in good condition and lots of good scoring.

Winner today with a terrific 41 points was Kevin Prendergast (17), 22 out and 19 in, piling on the points from hole to hole without pause. In second, Tamas Ladacs (13) went round in 18 out and 20 in, piping Andy Johnson (20), who went round in 21 out and 17 in, both compiling a considerable tally of 38 points each. In 4th was Mitchell Cohen, tied on points with Julian James in 5th, both making 35 points.

Women

The result couldn’t have been much closer, decided on the last 6 holes that Cheryl, Deb, Susan & Sheena had 5 pars and 1 bogey versus 4 pars and 2 bogeys.
Congrats to Ali, Bella, Caroline & Niamh who had nothing worse than a bogey all the way round.

Not easy conditions today after all the overnight rain had softened things up but definitely less stress out there with the 3 tee shot decision and at times a glorious sunny day for the first of the women’s winter team events.

Men

A little chilly but sunny and dry for the November Medal after the clearance of early rain.
The First (senior) division was keenly contested with both Allan Boyd and Paul Kamerling returning 69s Allan winning on countback but Paul recording best gross 77 of the day and also best back 9; well done. Tom Laybourn came a shot behind 70 for 3rd place.
In the Second division there was again a tie with both David Grace and Tony Kopczak 75. David won on back 9 countback. Ged Quinn came 3rd 76 and Gerard Ouattara 4th 77.
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The rain started around 10 o’clock time and did not stop until the last players finished their round. So the early starters definitely had the best of the weather. There were many sad and soggy scorecards along with quite a few who walked in off the course!! If the rain had been any heavier the course would have been unplayable with a lot of puddling on the greens.

However……
3 Players finished on 37 points with Julian James in first place on countback with 18 out and 19 back. Ged Quinn was 19 out and 18 back with a blob on hole 18. Justin Wildman had 20 out and 17 back with a 6 for 1point on the last hole.
The rest of us followed on.

A cold start for the 3 clubs plus putter Lissaman Cup.

Some great golf saw Tamas Ladacs win again with net 66 from Aidan Hurley 68; they shared front and back 9 honours. Duncan Taylor came 3rd on 70 while there were 5 71s from Michael Hayden, Richard Hanna, Rannesh Jansari, Rick Smith and best woman of day Nida Sozugecer.

For the men this was the 7th and final competition in the ‘Top Dog’ series and with the JH Taylor and 2 Courses KOs complete Aidan Hurley wins the senior division 38 from Michael Hayden 30; in junior division Abdullah Almasoud 21 wins from Michael Pham and Richard Hanna both 20. See attached report.

A fine pleasant day, at times quite warm even. However about a third of the field scored 30+ with one outstanding score of 47 points by Jeremy Prescot. 25 points on the front and 22 on the back. I’m sure WHS will suitably reward him. Kim Jabbour was 2nd 21 out and 18 back for his 39 points. Tamas Ladacs continued his good form with his 38 one point ahead of Justin Wildman with 37. Jonathan Evans just pipped Tom Simpkins on countback into 5th Place.

Women

The dire weather forecast not only put off some of our members but it was evident from the empty fairways on Prince’s that the public were also deterred. In the end it was just our last game that got a bit wet but nothing like what we were expecting.

Traditionally the women play a 4BBB but decided in view of the forecast, an American Greensomes would be faster especially with the men also playing greensomes.

Jayne & Joan played an incredibly steady round off 19 which was 6 less than anyone else today. Their only blips occurred within probably less than 2m from the pin & there weren’t many of them. With 43 points they were 3 points ahead of Niamh & Deb who were leaders in the clubhouse until our final game came in.

As it was our Autumn Meeting event prizes were also awarded for the best Front & Back 9. Jenny & Ali snuck the Front 9 on countback from Caroline (playing her first game post hip op – well done!) and Seshi and Laura & Sheena took the Back 9.

Cheryl also presented all the medal awards for the year along with the prizes for today and for the medal round that forms the other part of the Autumn Meeting. All present enjoyed the social gathering accompanied by pizza & chips.

Men

The predicted rain did eventually arrive but the impact on play was minimal.

Excellent scoring in the Burgess Cup (Greensomes); the pairing of Steve De Long and Maher Sharma ran away with it returning 48 points – 24 out and in. 2nd were Tamas Ladacs and Alex Fraser-Cannon on countback 42 points from Olav Bridie and Allan Boyd. Of the 3 next pairings with 40 points, Adrian Wells and Charles Haines had a stellar front 9 with 25 points but fell back on the last 9 with just 15.