Aldwickbury Park Early Birds

Good weather greeted us today and the last group was Paul Gardner, Tony Froud, Roger Gibbs and James Miller who would be our winner? An early start of 9:30am would mean we finish at a reasonable hour and we would not catch any traffic on the way home. The course was much quieter than yesterday and we managed to get around in just over four hours. Ground under repair on the 9th hole Baby bunny rabbits in the ground under repair on the 9th hole Prizes were awarded after the round with nearest the pins getting a sleeve of Titleist ProV1 each. Overall winner and second place and winners, second, F9 and B9 for each day also getting monetary prizes. The trophy for the winner of the Autumn cup was awarded to Martin Lythgoe well done Martin. Best gross of the day was a fine 84 by Jason, no prizes for best gross though, sorry Jason. Everybody said what a great time they had but based on the condition of the course they would prefer to go somewhere else next year. Martin has the pleasure of arra...

So back to Wokefield Golf Club for the Earlybirds Autumn Cup. This year organised by last year's winner Martin Deery. We managed to make 15 starters this year with Roger Small being allowed out to play and Coenraad joining us late due to a misunderstanding that he had entered but hadn't.  The weather was fair but quite windy and the course, like most others, had suffered due to the very hot summer. The worst part by far were the bunkers full of footprints, both human and animal. Greens were somewhat inconsistent, some fast, some slow and some fast and slow depending on where you were.  Anyway onto the golf , Paul won the day on countback from Roger Gibbs on a mediocre 33 points. The whole field was covered by eight points if you ignore one outlier. Could either of them or indeed James or Tony maintain their form through to the second day and take the trophy? After the golf we had a very nice meal but unlike last year there was no Ryder Cup, the Presidents Cup didn't seem to...

This was the last Swindle golf before the Earlybirds Autumn Cup who would be the inform golfer today and take it forward to the Autumn Cup? Dan Smith put on a splendid show taking first with 38 points, unfortunately for him he is not playing in the Autumn Cup but second place Jason his can he maintain the form? Dan had an amazing 22 points on the front nine before slipping back slightly with a 16 on the back. Roger Small winning the front nine with some consistent form of late. Well done to Steve Brewerton taking the back nine with 16 points, actually tied with three others but won on countback, Steve had a very solid last four holes which helped. Other news, after analysing the "data" the club has decided to go to 28 days booking rather than 14 days. Not sure how that is going to help anybody! The average gross score today was 95.50 and the average Stableford score was 30.88. Best gross of the day was from Jason Landau with 85. There were 0 Eagles or better today. There...

The course is undergoing a lot of maintenance work with new bunkers being installed or repositioned, the greens have also been hollow tyned and sanded. I'm sure all this work make the course much better in the future. Last week's Captain's day resulted in a haul of prizes for the Earlybirds and ex Earlybirds. Duncan, 1st team Paul, 2nd team Andy, 4th team Roger G, nearest in 2 on 18th Peter C, 4th team and second best stableford Coenraad nearest the pin On to today's golf, James is our winner today with 33 points and Martin Deery coming in second with 32. Well done to both of you. Some fine front nine scores of 18 points apiece for Dan and Coenraad. Reports of Roger's lost Pink Panther head cover had a good outcome after he found that he had dropped it loading his car in morning. From on course reporter Roger Gibbs "On the 2nd Hole, drive just short of the bunkers. Hit a 5 iron dead straight on the flag and caught a rather large branch on the tree on the left. ...

The weather was very kind to us today, dry with a light wind. The few days of rain we have had have turned the course green. The tee boxes looking very good and fairways to, as long as you don't look to closely. Talked to greenkeeper Kenny and he said they would be spiking the fairways and overseeding so hopefully that will improve things. The next phase of bunker renovations are due to start on Monday 14th September, and are scheduled to last 3 weeks. The holes affected are 1, 5, 6 & 7, in addition to this the old bunker on the 3rd hole which had pooling water over the winter, will have drainage installed to resolve this issue. A very up and down day for some with the winners not being decided until the early evening. This being due to some incorrect scores being entered for both Roger S and Martin D. I myself went from not winning anything, to winning something and then to not winning anything. Some of the confusion came on the ninth for group three where all but Martin went ...

The weather was somewhat different to what we have become use to over the last few months, we had some rain. The forecast was worse than the realty as it was mainly drizzle rather than the heavy rain forecast. The forecast did reduce the number of players but we still had 9 players, one dropping out early however. The golf was difficult as the conditions seem to change as we played, less run on the ball and greens were slower. After a few days of on and off rain the fairways even seemed a little greener. There was a hard fought battle for the win today with Martin Lythgoe starting with a fine 19 points but a few zero pointers on 11 and 12 set him back. Steve Reynolds was doing well until his last three holes only yielded three points. The contest was then between Paul and Roger Gibbs, Roger driving well today, always hitting the fairways. It came down to the last, Paul hit his second just off the back off the green, Roger hit a fine second but it trickled over the hump at the back and ...