It was a lovely warm and sunny Spring day and the Duke’s course was transformed from the last time we played it. The mowers had been to work on a firm, dry course and fairway definition was finally clear to see. For a change the white tees were used by the men, although they were still on the yellow teeing areas on the 5th, 10th, 15th, 17th and 18th holes.

The early leader in the clubhouse, Pralab Barua (38 points) was looking good until the final group came in and Julian James pipped Pralab on countback. There was more bad news for Pralab when his card was checked and found to have been incorrectly filled out. As usual, Julian’s card displayed a very consistent round, 20 points out and 18 points in, with 5 pars and one blob.

Second and third places were taken by playing partners Veronica Mitchell and Richard Owen, respectively, both 37 points and separated only by countback on the last 6 holes. Both had 21 points out and 16 points in, Ronnie notching up 4 pars and just one blob and Richard had 3 birdies (on the front 9), 3 pars and two blobs.

Sweep payout to top 3 (£9, £6, £3)

Spring golf made a (very) welcome return to the park. A large field enjoyed great weather and a course that is gradually being prepped by the greenkeeping team for a summer onslaught. The condition of the greens was a bit more debatable. But all in all scoring proved to be excellent today.

MW Captain Henry L-B set the early pace with an excellent score of 40pts. 2 birdies were offset by an untidy 7 on the 8th. Another early starter Wonil was just 1pt behind Henry. Henry’s score held for most of the day. Toby was the only player able to improve on the MW Captain’s score. 21pts on the way out and 20pts on the way in make him today’s winner. First woman of the day is the Woman’s Captain with a very steady 38pts. Usual suspect Peppe racked up another Top6 finsh. 22pts on the back 9 certainly helped (that score was matched by Handicap Secretary PaulG and Tony B.).

No less than 5 players ended with 38pts. Alan and Pralab being the last 2 players to end  “In the Money” (. Reiko and Ronnie confirmed the return in force of the female contingent (hope you saved some birdies for next week Ronnie). If Paul Brown would the sheer number of birdies on the 16th (7!!!) today he would probably never come back to the park.  Best front 9 goes to Alan King who needed only 8 holes to record 22pts!

Very pleasant early Spring conditions with drying worm-casts, sun and breeze. Greens were noticeably faster then we’ve experienced in recent months. UV levels matched by temp in results report plot.

Very good golf with countback placing Ulli 1st from Oz – both super 42s. John Cho 3rd 41, Martn Hay 40 with Gunnar (welcome back Gunnar) and Captain John39s. Junior Ethan maintained form 38 with previous captain Kim.

A shout out and congrats to John Cho who recorded the season’s first eagle at 9th.

After a chilly start, it was a lovely sunny Spring day but with a nagging (but drying) breeze. There are now significant signs of the grass growing and the Prince’s course was no longer wet and muddy.

Our winner Stephen Haworth (37 points) made a slowish start with 16 points on his outward 9 holes, which included 2 blobs, however he made light work of the back 9 with 5 pars and 21 points. 2nd, and beaten only on countback, was Peter Flint with a birdie start and a very steady round of 18 points out and 19 points in. Just behind on 36 points were yours truly and Mat Grove with my steady 18 points out and back just beating Mat’s 19 points out and 17 back.

Sweep payout goes to the top 3 as usual (£8, £5, £3)

Weather forecast convinced quite a few players to tee off early. The plan seemed to work like a charm especially when the rain intensified during the course of the day.

Juho, Alan and Gregory all set the early pace. But the honours go to two 9am starters. Peppe had a shaky start (DB – Bogey). But regained some impressive composure to finish the front 9 at +5 gross. His back 9 also showed some shaky patches. But he couldn’t regroup in the same way as on the front 9. He finished on 86 gross (66 Nett). This score proved too much of a hurdle for most players. Colm used a strong back 9 (40 gross) to better Peppe’s score by a whopping 4 strokes. Birdie on the 14th didn’t hurt.
First woman today is Cheryl Woodhouse. Lowest gross score was posted by Rob.

Breezy overall with spots of rain Sunday per bottom of results file and some run was available; last game got what sun there was. Ditch/trench across 9th fairway made an interesting feature:

Junior Ethan Ford crafted a professional 40 points to win the Plate and had 4 3s inc. one birdie at par 4 11th. Ethan will no doubt improve! Duncan Taylor had excellent back 9 22pts. Kerry Sargeant returned an excellent 38 pts with 1 over par on front 9 and 2 birdies. Kerry shared front 9 honours with Henry L-B. There were good 37s from Kim, Ulli and Robert C as well as 36s from Damber, Keith C and Paul K.

The predicted rain arrived around midday but wasn’t too bad, for most of us at least. Glendale’s closure of holes 8 and 9 for drainage trenching works was frustrating, however at least the 11th green was open.

Today’s clear winner was Adrian Wells, 35 points from 16 holes being 4 better than than his par off his Course Handicap. 16 points off the front 7 was the foundation and 19 points off the back 9 with one birdie and one blob completed a very solid round. 2nd and 3rd places, both with 32 points, were Veronica Mitchell and Ryan Jones respectively. It didn’t look as though it would be that way round when Ronnie started with a blob and Ryan had a birdie 3 for 4 points on the 1st, but it’s all about consistency and Ronnie’s 19 points on the back 9 pipped Ryan’s 17 points.

Sweep payout to the top 3 (£8, £5, £3)

Spring golf made a  very welcome return to the park. The Royal Parks deciding to cut trees today was not really part of the plan. Therefore we had to run the competition over 16 holes. Milder temperatures, sunshine, faster greens, better looking fairways and some decent golf were all present. Pity that access to the clubhouse itself was rather limited.

But see photo afterwards of new layout and floor covering

Onto to the main talking points. 3 players recorded 37pts. Chris Rudkin was the best thanks to his 21pts on the back 9 (only matched by Paul G). Brian started with a birdie and maintained an excellent level of golf over the first 7 holes (18pts). 2nd place is a nice return for a steady back 9 (19pts). Alan King was playing like a man possessed on the way out: -1 gross through 6 holes. A DB on the 7th didn’t stop him from scoring 20pts on the way out. He recovered after a wobble on the 10th hole to come home with 17pts. Angus tightens extends his lead in the birdie tree with 3 extra birdies (2nd, 3rd and 17th). 5th place goes to the Women’s Captain today. Pralab and Allan benefit from the women not taking part in the sweep (cf. attachment). The game of Alan King, Alvaro Garcia-Hoz and yours truly managed as a group  to record 5 birdies on the first 7 holes.

The competition also constituted final round of Midweek Winter competition and associated Duke’s Eclectic. Juho Lim and Pralab share the honours on 115 with Mike Jones and Secretary Peter Harrington joint runners-up 114. The Duke’s Eclectic champion is Richard Owen 59.2 with Angus Robertson and Brian Ransom close on his heels at 59.6 and 59.9 respectively.

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.

After the heavy rain we had earlier in the week, the Prince’s course was very wet with standing water in places both off and on the fairways (but not on any greens). The recent bounce and run on the fairways was gone and deep pitch mark repair was necessary on some greens. However, under these difficult conditions scoring was pretty good across the whole field and especially good for some.

Colm (40 points) was today’s winner, reportedly ‘trying’ on the front 9 (25 points including 2 birdies) and just ‘cruising’ on the back 9 (15 points with 3 blobs and 1 birdie). Brian put up a spirited challenge (39 points), with a strong back 9 including a birdie. (Pat had to buy the beers I believe). In 3rd place with 38 points was Peter Finch with a very solid round throughout. Sweep payouts go to these top 3 and as Ryan had to ‘retire hurt’ after 4 holes, his entry fee will be refunded.