This was played on 23rd July at Sherfield Oaks. Richmond Park ended up with just one representative, but we didn’t need any more! Caroline won the Bronze Division with a net 66.

Traditionally where the women invite one of the chaps to play with in an American Greensomes event – in reality many sign up individually and are then paired off!

Scoring seemed especially high, finishing with two pairs on 49 points. The winners getting 26 on the back 9 to seal their victory.

Susan and Nigel were the pair to take it from the women’s and midweek captain’s pairing of Sheena & Henry who only managed 25 on the back 9. Having been out in the first game they sat at the top of the leaderboard until almost the end and were quietly confident (to no avail). 2 points behind and probably fairly confident of a win as they got back to the clubhouse were Cheryl and Roger.

6 pairs recorded scores of 46 or better so definitely a good scoring day. The 2021 event was won with a mere 45 points.

As pizza and chips along with a drink on the club were consumed, prizes were awarded to the top 3 places and the women’s captain thanked everyone for participating in this fun event (especially when she came 2nd)

Today was a throwback to those days when waiting on every tee for every shot was commonplace on a Sunday – it evidently started from first thing as there were messages from those out before the clubs who could see what was happening (or not) ahead. But it was just such a lovely day weatherwise to be out there so long unlike Wednesday when we got soaked.

Women

Another case of beware the injured golfer. As author, your captain could give you a blow by blow account of the round – but it wasn’t very exciting. What was more surprising was that all 3 in the game (Cheryl, Katharina and Sheena) seemed to be pretty much level pegging on hole by hole scores. Cheryl says it ws down to lucky bounces which obviously made the difference and that was before she knew she’d been beaten by 1 shot into second place…. as we have a Whitewebbs match next weekend hopefully we can keep it going. (Footnote: sadly we didn’t!

Men

Nuisance rain on Sunday morphed into annoying rain for later participants But there was good golf throughout.

Ian Humphreys shot an amazing 56 on Saturday with just 2 over par through 9th; it was back to normal in a GPS round on Duke’s for Ian on Sunday. But Ian earned an ESR -1 adjustment going back to his earliest (16th) WHS round.. Nigel Ward had a super 60 for second and there were 61s from Goran, Brian (& best gross), Joe , Paul Green and Justin. Overall PCC remained at zero.
Congrats for 3 Eagles -Henry L-B 9th, James P 12th and Kevin P 17th.


This translates to divisional results:
Senior – Brian 1st Joe 2nd
Junior – Ian 1st Nigel 2nd


Also 3rd round of Grand Medal Trophy – Colm lead 193 but menacingly close behind on 200 is Paul Grand with Robin 204 and Peter H 205.

The first Saturday event of the year saw just 9 pairs playing. This is a mixed random draw event, so you don’t find out who your partner is until just before the event – & hope that you’ve drawn a good’un

It was good to see all the games coming in so swiftly one after the other with no large gaps anywhere – must have been a consequence of all that good play out there.

As this is a comp with awards at the annual dinner all the cards and technically should have resulted in a DQ for two pairs – thus raising the finishing place of those of us lower down the order. However as both have finished just outside the prizes I have left them but can’t check their scores.

Needless to say, the winners with an outrageous 49 points are HIlary & Colm (who were probably disappointed on the 5 holes where they scored less than 3 points) and 5 points back on a very good score of 44 was Joan & John who as first out sat there at the top of the leaderboard for most of the day.

Bacon rolls with tea/coffee before play were the order of the day, followed by a drink afterwards as we gathered for the first social event.

For the men, winter is over with the first event of the main competition season but the women, remembering previous March conditions played a team event. Indeed the weather may have been dry but out of the sun it was cold and conditions underfoot were decidedly boggy in places

Women

Another small field which shrank overnight to just 2 teams of 3. Two of the winner’s team had played at Easthampstead on the Saturday and obviously relished the relative ‘dryness’ of Prince’s today. As ever with these events the results were very close with just 1 shot separating the two teams, but undoubtedly Silvia’s ability to send the ball a long way will have helped them to reach many of the holes in regulation – not withstanding the tee shot she will want to forget on the 13th!! But the 2 birdies they scored also helped.

Men

A plucky back 9 from the Handicap Secretary led to a winning 63 from George Taylor and Dave Chilvers 64s. Robin Thomas had a glorious 65.

Congrats to Ross Hood who claimed 4 birdies to lead the Sunday tree. There were 5 birdies (‘Twos’) at new SI 18 11th.

In the divisional results George Taylor wins the senior medal 64 from Brian Ransom 66; The undersigned wins junior 63 from Dave Chilvers.

This was the first (of 8) rounds in the appropriately named Grand Medal Trophy and results mirror the day’s results.

Another beautifully sunny day to lull everyone into the idea of removing a few layers – not a good one if playing early with ice on the author’s windscreen this morning. However, the sun did it’s job and things warmed up considerably before the cold wind started to pick up again in the afternoon. Increasing temperature lagged slightly behind solar radiation per bottom of main men’s results. There was a little run and with the sun now noticeably higher in sky balls were easier to follow in flight.

Women

Perhaps I shouldn’t have told everyone ahead of playing how far behind the leader we were in the eclectic!! Still the weather went a long way to compensate. There was an interesting mix of conditions, with slightly firmer ground allowing for a bit of run, but in what direction – hard bits of mud/wormcasts lying around could certainly send the ball off course.
The largest field in the 4 rounds of Duke’s eclectic saw Ronnie take 1st place with a 32, 2 clear of Doreen in 2nd spot.

But as indicated in the start sheet there was little chance of catching Gina in the eclectic who improved her score by 2 to win on 76.4 from Sheena, just a few shots back on 81.8. However that was a 10 shot improvement on her previous score.

Both eclectics thus having the same outcome – 1st Gina, 2nd Sheena

Men

Continuing his Midweek winning streak Julian James was victorious with a late 42pts thwarting hitherto clubhouse leaders Mike Shabani and Pat Dalton (Pat if only those putts….). There were very spirited 38s from James P, Richard O and Colm.

Holes 8 and 9 were out of action for Saturday entrants but Dilip had 2 birdies on 7th and15th (4 and 5 points respectively).

This was final round for the Winter Comp so congrats to winner Colm 121 from Julian and Richard O 118.

Richard I is confirmed Duke’s Eclectic Champ 60.2 from Richard O. 63.4.

The storms of Dudley & Eunice did not appear to have caused too many fallen trees on the courses although sadly the rain has brought a return to the very wet conditions underfoot. Luckily the rain kept off as umbrellas would not have survived in what were still very windy conditions. Those with long memories will recall the October 1987 Hurricane – outcome more esp. with trees in full leaf multiplying the wind force.

Women

The scores don’t seem to have been unduly affected by the weather.

Susan is today’s winner, 4 clear of Sheena in 2nd and would have been more had she not book-ended her round with 7s. Interestingly, only 1 person scored on the 18th today.

It was also the last round of Prince’s eclectic (winter must be coming to an end!!) and we actually completed all 4 rounds which has become something of a rarity. The result of this never seemed in doubt from the first round, but in the end was a close result but Gina hung on in, winning by the slender margin of .5 on 68.4. Susan’s score improved by 1 but Sheena overtook her with a 2 shot change.

Congrats to both Susan and Gina

Men

A leprechaun provided a lucky tee to Sean O’Sullivan who smashed the back 9 – 25 and a ‘blob’ at 7th for 43 points; separated by countback on 41 were Saturday entrant Suhail and Colm. Marnix and Richard O put in strong 40pts performances.

Colm ensured winning of the Prince’s Eclectic on 55.1 from Paul K and Richard O 58.5s


Colm seems to have the Winter Comp sewn up on 118 from Roger R 115 with 5 on 114 – Secretary Peter, Sean, Richard O, Brian and Julian. With just 1 round left to play results are no longer on MS since misleading since software ignores the minimum of 1 round on each course.

Winter comps well underway now, with the first round now played on both courses. First real cold morning of the season- sunshine morphing into cloud and increasingly windy; passage of cold front showing in main men’s results with min 5C at 08:30 .

Women

Well what can I say! Pre-WHS this would have been a reduction only round since no one managed to reach the heady heights of 30 points, let alone 36. Nowadays of course it just means that it is highly unlikely that this will count as one of your best 8 rounds in WHS.
Seems the combination of the first really cold day, the leaves all over the place and heavy underfoot conditions caught us all out. So today’s winner was Monique with 28 points.
It was also the first round of the Eclectic, but if you look on the report for it, only 2 have a score as everyone else picked up once they’d run out of shots (or enthusiasm for the hole), so all that can be said for this is that there is room for improvement from everyone!!

Men

Play was off yellows and it was muddy despite no recent rain; some might have expected better scores but PCC was unchanged at zero. Maybe WHS handicaps settling down with less very recent joiners in early volatile WHS handicap timeframe.

Anyway, Tim Ash Vie emerged from the pack to win on 39 points with 3 followin 37 – Barry, Roger and Russell.

This was round 2 of the Winter Competition and fresh from holiday golf, Secretary Peter H took advantage to share lead with Julian and Roger 73; Russell just behind 72.

In the associated first Duke’s Eclectic round, Russell has the advantage 76.5 from Mark B 76.6.