Women

Perhaps it was all those years being toughened up in the army, but unlike the rest of us the wind and rain of today seemed only to enhance Donna’s play. Finishing a mere 6 points ahead of Julie with 39 and 33 points respectively. In our game, mud balls and the rough certainly played its part. With a 10 point difference between her score today and the first week’s leader, Donna is the well-deserved winner of the Committee Cup overturning a 5 point deficit with ease. Her total score was 72

Donna was left to rue her decision not to confirm entry into the UKPCC letting Julie, in 2nd spot, win through to be our qualifier. Others may qualify if scores from other clubs are as low as ours today!!

Men

Cool conditions with odd shower were inappropriate for The Summer Cup.
Compared with recent weeks scoring was subdued but Uli came out on top with 38 points from Rhys, Alan and Kevin.

Unusually no ‘Twos’ were recorded.

Resu;ts below depict UKPCC entrants with a tick.

Women

Can’t imagine for one moment that Donna, on her first round back with the club for some time, thought her 74 would be good enough to win today, especially as she didn’t rush to enter her score!
We didn’t exactly set the course on fire with our scores today, in the old days it would have been a reduction only round, but of course such things no longer exist. Following Donna, 4 of us fought it out for 2nd spot with 75s with Gina taking the place deservedly so with 2 birdies on her card.
Let’s blame the speed or rather the lack of it for putting us off our games. Three balls don’t seem to be making the rounds much shorter/quicker at all. But it was a good day weatherwise although the wind kept its bite. The lack of recent rain could be seen by how much the pond on the 10th had dried up from our last visit to Prince’s 2 weeks ago.

Men

A gorgeous spring day greeted competitors with that nagging nor’easter from arctic having gone.
Greens seemed watered but we still need natural rain.

Louis Dickey shot an astoinishing net 60 and but for a 7 at 18 we would be saluting him as ‘Mr 59’!

From the back of the field, Julian shot the lights out for 62; Mitch won 3rd on countback from father Ben D 65; Ant and Rannesh returned 66s.

This time it was Ned’s turn for an eagle at 9 – well done!
The results double as first of the Grand Medal Trophy.

The first mixed medal round on Duke’s since the introduction of WHS caused a few surprises. With both yellow and white tees in operation, the women received an additional 5.1 shots for their competition handicap (men off white’s got 2.1). With slope adjustment as well, both Sheena & Veronica were playing off 23 and they made good use of all those shots to finish 1st and 3rd respectively. Neither had recorded good scores since the return to play until today when 19 or one third of the field recorded No Returns and this before the grass has started to grow with any vigour.

Sheena’s net 67 was a card of double bogeys or pars, not total consistency! Also on a 67 is new joiner MikeH, possibly benefiting from a lockdown spent playing golf on the IoM but perhaps ruing the 7 on the 17th to allow my back 9 to beat his. For Veronica and Russell both on 68s there was a similar situation with Russell’s snowman on the 12th giving Veronica the better back 9.

Initial reports were of another eagle sighted in the Park, but unfortunately correct identification provided only a birdie. It would have been very unusual to record eagles in 3 consecutive weeks.

The redeeming feature of the day for those behind the leaders was that neither Sheena nor Veronica were in the sweep, but with 51 people in it payment is down to 9th place (excluding Sheena & Veronica):

The associated Grand Medal table will show the same results as today, so will be included after the next medal.

What a difference a week makes! Last Wednesday shorts and tee-shirts were the order of the day which could be where some of the non-finishers went wrong. To compound things, many of us experienced a wait on many of the tees which is never good but especially when there is a biting wind. A combination no doubt of this and the fact that it was a medal round in the second week back since lockdown gave rise to 18 of the field ‘No Returning’.
Of course, none of this affected some people with early starter Ewan posting an unassailable 63 making him the winner of The Master Bowl. JohnA will be pleased that I checked he hadn’t in fact played off the yellow tee (in which case he would have been DQ’d with his HI). The additional shot allowance for the white tee elevated him to the runner-up spot with a better back 9 than RichardS, both on 65s. Alvaro pipped Julie for 4th place with 66s and I made up the top 6 topping the 4 on 68s, no doubt because my back 9 was 11 shots better than the front!

Another week and another eagle – with apologies to MikeS for not spotting that his 2 last week wasn’t on a par 3, but the 18th. This week was Alvaro’s turn with a 2 on the 15th.

The first competition back after lockdown saw the highest turn-out for a midweek comp with 70 entrants & of course with the machine at the Park still on furlough those with what they hoped were good scores, could be biting their fingernails to the quick waiting upon this missive.
Hopefully those at the top were the ones constantly practising their chipping and putting in lockdown, to make the rest of us feel a bit better about our performances and the greenkeepers look to have been feeling sympathetic to you chaps after the 3 month layoff with all those forward tees, although Gina gave most of you a good run for your money, making it into last place in the sweep. Timing her re-entry into the sweep with precision.
If we had been hoping for pristine conditions, we were sadly let down. The best thing was that it was dry underfoot and that there was definition on the edge of most fairways, but they themselves looked like it had been very wet and just dried out. Hopefully now they have all the staff working again things will improve — but it was a nice day, if not gloriously hot like Tuesday, and good to see lots of ‘old’ faces again.

So who won – probably just as well for Darren & Charlie that the leaderboard wasn’t operational as the final group of the day produced the winner on 41 points. Congratulations to Ben with a very even 20 out and 21 back. Darren’s better back 9 of 21 gave him 2nd spot ahead of Charlie who did it the wrong way round with 22 on the front, both finishing on 40. The next 3 all came in on 38, Diego obviously recovering from what we were told by the starter, to be a rather inauspicious start, spraying his first into the bushes on the left followed by one to the right.

As the results are only out now, WHS has done all it’s calculations, with no change to the PCC and quite a few changes to Handicap Indexes. Congrats Charlie, looks like you’ve dropped to single figures for the first time (in this system anyway).

With 61 players in the sweep, payment has been made to 8th place today

fyi – once the clubhouse is open we will ask you all to sign in before playing and record your scores before leaving the Park

Cold with a light breeze greeted the 59 competitors for the New Year stableford Sweep in pairs. A warm welcome to new members Dilip and Onursal who were first in RPGC to actually play in the comp on Saturday.

Scores never cease to amaze and this on Duke’s in winter with mud where good play is at a premium. Aung returned a blistering 44 points to win. Well done again to Aung – this time last year you had UHS handicap 41 but now after the round (one of your best 8 from last 20) your handicap index drops to 26.4.

In form new member Nafeez struck again 42 points , Keith a good’un 40, Ben D 39 with Pete H and Lee M commendable 38s. Best of women was Katharina 33 points – this was after the additional ‘Mixed Tee Adjustment’ for the red and yellow tee/slope combo of +1′. Results

With payouts for best 8 and separate women’s pool congrats to prize winners.

Storm ‘Bella’ cleared and players fought through the mud burning the Xmas kilojoules.

PeterN returned a superb 40 points to win – keeping a 6 off his card fresh from driving range practice. Three followed on 39: Bennie, Damber and consistent WHS improver Brian. Results…

John A had pocketed 2 birdies through 4th whilst there were commendable birdies on long 13th from Richard B and Bennie.

Reflecting perhaps a more aggressive and positive swing, Julie R was convincing women’s prize winner 32 pts from Katharina 29 and Ronnie & Gina 28s.

A little more time to adjust the sheet for today, although the start sheet ended up being published at least 4 times to accommodate changes which are a lot more problematic when playing in 2-balls. In the end 34 played.

Whilst the weather wasn’t exactly ideal, it could have been a lot worse with the showers being just that and the sun making a welcome visit if only for a short time. It did put rather a damper on Christmas jumpers and hats – but they were evident on a few. Unfortunately the rain since the weekend is starting to bring back memories of last winter underfoot. It was a bit like skating on mud at times.

As ever, there are always a few for whom these conditions appear to offer no great challenge and today’s winner, Peter G with 43 points is definitely one. He has had one blip during December when he managed only 30th spot but apart from that has definitely been in the money and is evidently at home in the mud! Playing in his first competition after gaining his handicap, Nafeez was just one point behind in 2nd spot. Last man in the 40s was Bennie with a 41. First woman, in 9th spot was Gina. Results…

The wheel literally fell off the men’s handicap secretary today so his 16 points were just for 10 holes – apparently the front wheel came off his electric trolley which would be a challenge if the ground underneath was dry!