Founders Cup – Mrs Millidge (5/6) 

The day belonged to the 9am starters. Just like last week the winner played with the duo of Alan K and yours truly. Alvaro had an excellent front 9. But the middle of the front 9 was really interesting: birdie on 5, a double digit score on 6 followed by … a birdie on 7. That roller coaster returned 21pts going out. His last last 9 holes were less volatile. But the 18pts on the back 9 and the fact that he was awarded 13 (!) shots today were the perfect assist to today’s win. Chris R was the best of the rest. He seems to thrive in the MW Founders Cup (more on that later). 37pts are enough for 2nd today (he will regret his scores on holes 17-18 though).  First woman of the day is Pat. Her 19pts on the way in edge her past the Men’s Secretary (who will have regrets about the 17th …). Seymour is a deserving 5th today. 6th place belongs to the person who was expected to show up in orange today. What happened to the Rickie Fowler trend Cheryl? Due to some people opting out of the sweep the payouts reached out to Richard Y and Chris N respectively.

MW Founders Cup Standings (TBC)
Chris R (142), Gina (140 – doens’t hurt when your previous low score of 20pts drops off today), KSC, RIchard Y and Peter H (all 132). So it’s a 2 horse race.

Humid conditions for the JQ Robertson but predicted rain didn’t arrive until after play.

Well done indeed to the overall winner Raymond who shot an amazing 44 pts – 22 out and 22 in with one ‘blob’. WHS applied an ESR of -1.0 and he now 10.0 from 12.4.

Two women followed – Jenny 41 [front 23] and Alison 38 [22 back with 3 4 pointers inc 17^th and 18^th]. Dilip beaten on back 9 also 38pts.

For the men this was 2^nd competition in the ‘Top Dog’ order of merit. In the senior division Raymond shares lead 12points Ross Hood ahead of Joe G and Toby each with 8. The junior has clear leader Dilip 14 from Onursal. See attached report.

The drought and the high(er) temperatures are starting to take its toll on the course. The extra distance gained from the roll and bounce on the fairways very welcome for most of the field. The greens seemed more receptive too. However the penalty from bouncing/rolling off the fairway was steep since the rough is becoming more and more punishing.

None of this bothered the Top5 today. All of them had +40pts.
Russell changed his tactics. He abandoned the 7am starters. A bit of traffic drama made him show up just in time to tee off. The rest of his round was drama free. Even better: he probably would’ve been able to walk on water today. He could not be faulted. 8/10 he had an Up & Down from 70yds and shorter. Numbers speak for themselves: 24pts (front 9) and 20pts (back 9 – largely due to an ugly DB on the 17th – his sole 1-pointer of the day – he had 0 PU’s). ESR on its way …

Chris J played an excellent back 9 (25pts – 5*3pts, 1*4pts). Unfortunately he finishes just 1pt behind Russell. Peter G also torched the last 9 holes. A score of Level par gross awards him 23pts and 3rd place. 1st lady of the day was in form Cheryl. 19+22pts are her competition stats today. She must have some serious regrets over her PU on 8. Dave C is the last of +40 gang. Spare a thought for Alex B. He stood on the 15th with 34pts … Tommy H birdied the 2 par 3’s on the front 9 and parred the 13th.

Hot and humid conditions prevailed although rain and thunder arrived – but after cards returned.

Women

Perhaps Katharina has found the secret to playing well – send Uli away so no pressure on who is cooking dinner! A net 65 which would have been considerably lower without a 10 on the 17th has resulted in an ESR being applied – most unlike WHS which often seems to gift those who play well with either no change or an increase as older scores drop off. Katharina sees a drop from 20.5 to 18.4.
If realisation of how her game was going suddenly hit on that hole, it didn’t harm the last which resulted in a birdie finish (1 of 2 with Bridget also finishing well).

Bridget in fact finished 2nd, 5 shots behind and she got a much smaller .5 cut

Men

Tamas won the senior division with a well-crafted and consistent 64. He was chased by Michael Hayden 66 and best Mark Bean 67(also best gross 78 on countback).

In the junior division Richard Young shot an astonishing 60 proving the value of technique and practice. Onursal followed with a fine consistent 64 and Julian J 65; Julian’s round was superb except for the SI 1 7th where he recorded 12.

In 4th round aggregate of the GMT both divisions headed by only 3 players to complete the 4 rounds to date:
Senior: Tamas 278, Oz 294, Richard B 299

Junior: Dilip 277, Tom Simp 286, Tony K 286

As with recent days it warmed up with the sun melting clouds but still a chilly wind.

Like Sunday, a third of the field NR’d but the PCC calculation was +1.
Winner of the medal was Toby H wit a very fine 70; just one shot behind was Cheryl 1 – had Cheryl’s birdie at 16 been repeated then she would have won by a margin. Pat B and Alex B followed with 71s.

Jay took best gross 80 and both front and back nine honours.

Graham C leads the Midweek Grand Medal (best 5 from 8 rounds) but are only players to have completed 4 rounds.

Another brilliantly ‘blazing’ June day with glorious sunshine. The NE wind kept temps down.

With a third of the field NR’ing you might think a positive PCC would arise – but it didn’t and remained at zero.

Anyway, there was still some very good golf – from ‘in-form’ players. Cheryl took the honours with a glorious 65 after an inspiring win in the Women’s Invite the day before. Such is the nature of WHS that her HI remained the same because she ‘lost’ a good counting score from January. An amazing round with birdie at 17th – well done! Another recent winner Richard Young challenged with a 66 for second place ahead of Raymond 68; wrt WHS again, Richard’s HI actually increased 0.3 since he ‘lost’ a better score from last August in the best 8 averaging.
Many no doubt NR’d due to still thick rough.

Spare a thought for Raymond – he stood on 13th tee level par and recent birdies at 11 & 12. Raymond returned best grossof the day 81 but dropped all the shots 13-18.

This was first Jubilee of 4 in the Anniversary Cup.

If Karma played golf it would’ve made Kevin Prendergast winner today. But that script never materialised. After underwhelming scoring last Sunday on Princes things looked rather ominous for today’s field. The rough was still stupidly high. And the bounces on the fairway/fringes were extremely unpredictable. But it has to be said that the field outperformed (and that is putting it mildly). 3 of the players finishing in the Top 5 went out at the crack of dawn.

Gina’s brisk pace of play (she and Ross finished 18 holes in 2h37) translated into an excellent score of 37pts. But her mark was bettered by Vinny (39pts). Alan T had a remarkable eagle on the 5th. 18pts out and 24pts in are his final numbers. The 9am starters did have the final laugh. Richard Y picked up on 3 holes on the front 9 (17pts). But he blew everyone away with 25pts on the back to snatch victory from Alan. Chris R had an excellent round (19+22pts). But he will have regrets about the 18th hole (recorded a DB). It has to be said that the tee-shot on the 18th  from the white tees is becoming quite daunting. In a couple of years you will either have to use an 8 iron to just get on the fairway or (as Sam W does) bend/slice it around the trees. Finally Ross has to thank Gina for not entering the sweep. He is the last player to get a “positive purse adjustment”.

MW Founders Cup Standings
Chris Rudkin (132), KSC (131), Gina (128 – but she has a great opportunity to make up ground the coming weeks), PDH (124).

Similar conditions of late prevailed but warmth 23 C from sunshine was abated by wind.

Women

Men

The rough was not a place to be in, ruining a hole’s score; run on fairway sometimes ran unexpectedly into bunker and hard greens needing water wouldn’t hold pitches and were ‘fast’.
Additionally loose plastic liners at top of holes annoyingly lifted and needed replacing for next player. Greens having dried out since placing of liners.
Unsurprisingly PCC was again lifted to +1.

But there was some good golf. Winner by one point was Luke R 38 pts with good front 9 21 pts and a birdie at first. Chasing one point behind were Alan K and Duncan T. Duncan with an inspired back 9 24pts.

Sam Williams recorded 3rd men’s Sunday eagle of year at 17 [total eagles 5] – well done!.

The field enjoyed links like conditions on a parkland course. The extra roll on the fairways was a welcome sight to a lot of people. But the thick/high rough and unpredictable bounces on the fairways caused a lot of problems.

To state the obvious: this wasn’t even close. Gina was the only player in the field to play better than her HI. She used an excellent back 9 (+2 gross – 22pts) to race to victory. Back to back birdies on holes 13 & 14 sure helped. 41pts and a ticket to UKPCC regionals represent a nice day at the office. Early starters also take places 2&3. Alan and Naveed both recorded 35pts. Alan had the better back 9 (21pts). Naveed had more birdies. An ugly DB on 12 dented Naveed’s chances. The first 9am starter comes in at 4th. Toby had a good front 9 (20pts). But 5 1-pointers on the back 9 were his undoing. Another early bird claimed 5th. Russell will regret the PU’s on holes 5,9 & 13. Final money spot goes to Jeremy P. His round could’ve been more rewarding had the unpredictable bounce/rolls from the fairways not made him lose tee-shots on 4 (!) holes.

MW Founder Standings: KSC (98), PDH (96), Toby (91), Gina (91)

It started bright and breezy but cloud grew and it became grey and not as warm as forecast, just nudging 20C.

Women

It’s strange how the back 9 on Duke’s which on paper looks tougher often yields good results & whilst not so for everyone most scored better on that half.
Scoring looks to be a little hard going which is fairly normal for this time of year, but very frustrating nonetheless.
It’s pretty much all to play for next week though Cheryl does hold a 2 shot lead on the rest of the field.

Men

John Morris shot an outstanding front 9 of 27 points [avg 3 per hole] to win the Summer Cup on 41 points. Overall conditions proved tough and PCC was + 2 meaning John was cut from 21.2 to 20.0. 4 shots behind was Suhail 37, Giovanni 36 and Charlie W 35.
Suhail started off with 6 bogey 5s whilst Giovani had a cracking start – 12 points after 3 having birdies at 1 and 3 (each worth 5 points). Charlie picked up honours for the more difficult back 9.