Day 201 - Foxhills Return

The weather men have promised us a decent week's weather - very welcome after what had appeared to be the end of summer a short while back. So, it was with a sense of pleasurable anticipation that I headed off for a return Vets match at Foxhills Golf Club.  Never quite sure what Monday morning traffic had in store for me, I headed off nice and early and arrived...nice and very early!  No worries though: time for a few coffees and a chat with the opposing team.

I was paired today with Malcolm, a former Shell colleague, and we were second off playing today on the Bernard Hunt Course .  The whole place was very busy as the other course, the Longcross, was hosting a Pro-Am for the Severiano Ballesteros Foundation.   There was a Pro from Burhill in the field as well as a team of Ams so we were well represented at Foxhills today!

I had the sort of start you dream about: par, par, chip-in birdie, par for my first 4 holes - and this was good enough to give us a four hole lead too.  Another three pars in the front 9 meant that we made the turn 5 up.  An excellent sausage bap at the halfway house didn't seem to do any harm and three more pars followed before we won our match by 6&5!  I am afraid that our opponents didn't really stand a chance - but they were very good hosts and good fun to walk around with.

Afer a good lunch and the usual speeches (two good stories from the match managers!), we headed home.  I have played Foxhills a number of times in the past, but have never seen it looking and playing better. All this rain and sun we have been having has clearly helped.

This evening was spent in front of the PGA Golf - a rare treat, but they are finishing a day later than normal as it's Labor Day States-side: that means that summer is officially over....

Day 200 - Autumn Meeting Mishap

Today was the second day of the Autumn Meeting: yesterday was the competition for the low handicappers and today was the turn of the Foursomes experts.  I was playing with Brian and we were teeing off the 1st tee (as usual - Captain's privilege!).  The weather was simply stunning: not a cloud in the sky nor a breath of wind - a splendid late summer's day.

After a string of double bogeys, we soon realised that we were not going to be in the prizes and concentrated instead on enjoying the day - not difficult given the conditions. We had a few good holes in there somewhere but a four-putt on the 17th was probably the low point...  They say you should never say "sorry" when playing Foursomes: I think we managed that at least!

After the competition, it was time for Prize Giving. The table looked splendid with some of the Club's very best silverware on show: three of the solid silver trophies were simply wonderful.  We were handing out trophies back to the Spring so there were plenty of recipients from whom celebratory drinks were solicited, not always successfully. 

The winner of yesterday's competition (another serious piece of silver!) couldn't unfortunately be there for the prize giving, so then it was time for today's results. At this point, a mea culpa is required: I had inadvertently overlooked one of the cards with the same score as the pair whom I believed to have won.  Oops...

Fortunately, the mistake was soon rectified and was accepted by all with good grace. The only casualty was one red-faced Captain...  All was soon forgotten though because the appearance of the extra card meant that we had a play-off in front of us. This was supposed to take place on the 18th hole of the same course as had been played but, by popular request, we moved it to the New Course - right in front of the 100 or so people there watching.

A daunting task for the two players required to tee off: having had the experience of the Captains' Drive-in, I had more sympathy than most - which soon needed as one of the pairs made a right horlicks of the hole, allowing the other two to win with a solidly played one-over-par 4.  Cue lots of celebrations and commiserations in equal portions. It had though been one of the best finishes to a competition of the year - the atmosphere was terrific!

Day 199 - Vardon, Interlock or Baseball?

First day of our Autumn Meeting today: two opportunities to get your name up in gold available - either today for the best gross score in the Marler Bowl, or else the best nett result tomorrow with your Foursomes partner in the Lewis Kent Cup.

I had been paired with Duncan, the Club Champion and previous winner of today's competition, and Andrew, who also has his name on the Marler Bowl Honours Board. Exalted company, therefore.  And not a little daunting either...

Everything started off well for me with two good solid pars on holes 1 and 2. Then an inexplicable 70y pitch onto the green went short and right into the greenside bunker and that was that. Managed to hang on for a while but then had another couple of "blob" holes and before long it was clear that it was not going to be my day.  I enjoyed the round though, watching the two better players spark off each other and seeing how easy the game can be if you could only drive long and straight (and a few other things as well!).

On the 15th fairway, Duncan posed an innocent question about my grip: did I use the Vardon grip, or interlocking or the baseball version? Wow... I answered immediately that I had always been a Vardon man. And then on the next shot, I paused and looked down: there was no finger overlapping - it was a baseball grip! 

This really threw me and, for the rest of the round, I was mildly spooked.  Back to the range time required...

Homeward bound for a difficult afternoon: whether to watch England/Ireland Rugby, England/Australia cricket, F1, European Golf or the England/San Marino football?  Not watching the last one was the easy choice. In the end I went with the Rugby...

Day 198 - Dear Lupin

A while back we had bought tickets for a play up in London, largely on the strength of its cast: James Fox and his youngest son Jack.  The play was called Dear Lupin, and we hadn't really done much research into it, although we could tell that it was struggling a bit at the box office as there were a number of good deals around.  Today, we went up to London to see it - and, perhaps because of the lowered expectations, very much enjoyed it.

The play was an adaptation of a book from 2012 which had been a surprise hit: a series of letters from the Sunday Times racing correspondent to his wayward son, stretching back for 30+ years.  The latter had gone through really rough times (expelled from Eton, drug and alcohol dependency, HIV/AIDS) so not an obvious source of comedy but the father had a nice turn of phrase and seemed to retain a stoic attitude throughout. Having a genuine father and son play the roles, the final few scenes as the father died contained genuine emotion that perhaps would not have worked so easily otherwise.

After we returned home, I did as I always do and read some of the reviews on-line, which were pretty fair IMHO. A light piece but one rescued by the cast and their obvious love for one another. Dads - take your sons along!

The earlier part of the day was golfing free (a busy few days ahead!) but still involved a fair amount of work, getting everything ready for the launch of what is arguably the premier men's event at Burhill Golf Club, the Auction Foursomes Dinner and Golf. This is to be held on 16th October and needs a good attendance to work properly.  We launched the online sign-up today, so fingers crossed...

Day 197 - Slow Play

If you enter the following phrase into any generic search engine "Golf's biggest problem" or the equivalent and, right up there, you will come across the issue of Slow Play.  I know that at Burhill, whenever we have a competition that takes longer than it should, you can be sure that there will be people in the bar complaining about how slow other players are (it is always someone else who is the cause of the problem...).

A couple of years back, we spent a lot of time at the Club and in Committee trying to see what there was that could be done about it.  We came to the conclusion that the solution was not to be found in one silver bullet, but instead that there were many things that each of us could do (if you're interested, this list can be found here).

Why this topic today?  I was playing a 2-ball with the Vice Captain and we were walking up the 14th fairway when we noticed a large group of people, some in buggies, on and around the 9th green.  We stopped to ask what they were doing when we saw that they had cameras and related equipment as well. It turned out that it was a team from Golf Monthly who were at Burhill to film 10 educational videos addressing Pace of play issues.  These are due to appear shortly on their website - so I for one shall be looking out for them!

I can report that Slow Play was not an issue today!  Steve and I finished our game in under three hours and the two other pairs with whom we were competing were both hot on our heels.  We played a better ball game and my partner and I were cautiously optimistic when we got back with a score of 40 points.  Pride goes before the fall...  The other scored 42 and 45 points (bandits...) which left us picking up the drinks tab...

Day 196 - Brotherly Love

The weather gods decided to smile on us again today: after a few very dreary days, the clouds lifted and the sun shone on the righteous... and also those who were at Burhill today for the Vets Member/Guest Day. This is a great event as it gives us all a chance to showcase the Club, its courses and facilities to other golfing friends.

In my case, I had invited my brother Tony as my guest. He is a member at Haywards Heath Golf Club, where he has just recently re-established his handicap. Our playing partners today were Steve, the organiser-in-chief of the event and Terry, his brother-by-marriage (their children are married..or is there another term?).

The format for the day was a better ball Stableford, off 3/4 handicap.  To start our round, brother Tony kicked off well, allowing me some 4 holes or so to get into the game. A sneaky chip-in for par on 5, a mammoth putt for a birdie on 6: finally, I woke up too!  And even more fortunately, we both stayed awake, coxing-and-boxing well and, with consecutive birdies on 12 and 13, started scoring well.  A good putt on 17 for a 5 and a fine par on the last put the icing on the cake. We had managed to return a round of 2 over par, equivalent to 43 points, and now had to wait to see whether or not it was enough...

Duly showered, suited and booted, we all enjoyed an excellent carvery lunch upstairs and then it was time for prize giving. As Captain, I was on duty and on this occasion, I had no Lady Captain to help me out.  Yes, we had won and I had to present the prize to Tony and then to myself.

Happy as he was to receive his prize of a couple of bottles of wine, Tony was less impressed that he was also required to say a few words to the assembled golfers. His job was to say thanks on behalf of the guests as well as to pay the usual compliments to the green-keepers, caterers and organisers. 

He needn't have worried - he did a grand job!

Day 195 - US Open

After a number of days of consecutive golfing, today was one for taking a break from the course.  Accordingly, I took the opportunity of going up to London to meet a former colleague for lunch. Another day of déjà vu all over again - memories came flooding back as I took the train to Clapham Junction and on to Victoria and the Zizzi restaurant to be found in Cardinal Place. How I miss this journey... not!

A good chat over lunch: amazing how so many of the issues are just the same, albeit with a few different actors; on departure, I wished Jim every success but was glad that it was he rather than I who was tasked with addressing them!

Then back to the Club to sit down with Mike to do the draws for the Autumn Knockout competitions.  These days, the work is not in actually doing the draw: this involves just a few keystrokes on the computer, bu rather in cutting and pasting (literally!) the printouts into something vaguely coherent to put up for general viewing.  The Men's competition has so many entrants that getting everything onto one sheet just wasn't possible.

Back home to watch some of the US Open tennis. Not sure that I shall be staying up for Andy Murray's match in the early hours of tomorrow morning though...