Day 213 - Banzai!

The last Medal of the year... from now on, we move into Stableford season, in anticipation of the worsening weather and more difficult playing conditions. Not that that was a problem today, with glorious Autumnal sunshine and nary a drop of wind. That must have meant that Is cored well, right/ Afraid not: after a solid 5-4 start, I managed to get lost in the trees on the right of the 3rd hole, booked a 9 and that was that!

It was a pleasant round though - all the more so in that we got around in under 4 hours, helped by the two groups who let us through as they struggled to locate errant golf balls lurking in the long grass.  As one of my playing partners remarked to me: "enjoy it, Martin, next year when you're a nobody like the rest of us, you'll have to wait!".

Our good timing allowed us to get back to the bar just in time to see the final putts from the morning round of the Solheim Cup: impressive young lady is that Charley Hull (I once played against her on the par 3 9th at the Buckinghamshire in an EY charity day and managed to get closer to the hole than she - I have a signed ball to prove it!).

Before going out in the evening, we had a plethora of sport to choose to snooze in front of: in the end, the Davis Cup doubles from Glasgow won out and kept us wide awake: some seriously passionate fans and players on show there. 

That meant that we did not see all of the South Africa-Japan rugby game, but anyway it would be a fairly predictable affair anyway. The underdogs would tire in the second half and the Springboks would then run away with it... wrong!  An amazing finish to the most exciting game I have ever seen played in Brighton... if the rest of the RWC keeps up with this quality of game, we are in for a real treat!