PSC Charity Classic raises B.210,000 for local charities

The second Pattaya Sports Club Charity Classic, held on Friday the 15th of May at Phoenix Golf & Country Club, exceeded expectations and raised B.210,000 for Banglamung Home for the Aged; Redemptorist School for the Blind; The Fountain of Life Children’s Center and Banglamung Schools Self-Help Food Project.

Photo: Doug Powell (center), by virtue of his 55 Stableford Points, earned Best Individual Stableford Score at the Pattaya Sports Club Charity Classic 1998. Pictured with Doug are Bill Collis (left) and PSC Golf Chairman Mike Franklin.

The Tournament, staged at a very well prepared Phoenix Mountain and Lakes Nines, enjoyed fine weather and an enthusiastic turnout of twenty two teams who contributed generously through the purchase of Charity Mulligan Lucky Draw Tickets, providing the opportunity to participate in 20 Technical Hole Prizes and over 100 Lucky Draw Prizes with a combined value of over B.200,000.

Details of winners follow, together with a grateful acknowledgment to the many companies and individuals who sponsored holes, made contributions or supplied prizes for the Lucky Draw. The Organising Committee are grateful to Phoenix Management for their cooperation and efficient help on the day.

Coronation Cup Yachting: Thai sailors no match for Filipinos

by Peter Cummins, Pranburi

Expedito P. Garcia and his trusty team from the Subic Bay Yacht Club came to the Phatra Marina and Yacht Club Pranburi last week, bent upon revenge for their crushing defeat at the hands of a Thai team last month, led by Viroj Nualkair.

That occasion was the Second President’s Cup Regatta, held on Subic Bay, Philippines where the Thais thrashed the Filipinos - and others including Hong Kong’s Warwick Downes - to win the Farr Platu Racing Keelboat Division of the President’s Cup.

Photo: Lots of wind and lots of action at Pranburi.

There is absolutely no doubt that Garcia’s team, sponsored by Watercraft Ventures of Subic Bay and comprising Louie Perfectua, Allan Balladares, Stephen Tan and Lino Perfectua, was superior at last week’s Third Coronation Cup, winning four out of the five races of the regatta "Championship Division". But, alas, in terms of "revenge", it was somewhat anti-climactic. Viroj’s winning team at Subic, a combination of Pattaya’s Royal Varuna Yacht Club and Pranburi’s Phatra Yacht Club sailors - Jaray Tipsook, Cheerut Sudasna, Rut Subniran and Kevin Whitcraft - was unable to compete at Pranburi. As denizens of the host club, the team members were dispersed to various points of race management and regatta organization: a "noblesse oblige" syndrome.

One can only surmise how Viroj’s Thai "conquerors of Subic Bay" would have fared with the combined advantages of home waters, familiar winds and an intimate knowledge of tidal and wave action off the Pranburi, Prachuab Khiri Khan coast.

So, Expedito had to be satisfied with beating Warwick Downes’ Hong Kong Yacht Club team, his fellow Filipino Mark Haswell’s Manila Yacht Club entry, first Thai team, Royal Thai Navy’s Verasit Puangnak, with David Race and Pana Trungkabunchar, sailing under the aegis of Phatra Yacht Club, finishing second to sixth, respectively.

However, the Thai flag was ‘writ large’ in the second group of the regatta, the Platu Division, where Phatra Yacht Club’s Schle Wood, with four firsts and one third placing beat first Royal Varuna Yacht Club entry Peter O. Herning (2,2,2,2,5), with Ian Coulson’s Lee Marine/Ao Chalong Yacht Club team (1,3,3,3,3) and Royal Hong Kong’s George Strome (5,6,4,4,2), third and fourth.

The 1998 Coronation Cup Regatta, the third such to be held to honour His Majesty King Bhumibhol Adulyadej’s accession to the Thai Throne in 1946, this year went international, with top teams from various countries coming in to participate. It also marked a new format, which, according to Viroj Nualkair, the prime mover of this great event, is somewhat like the format of football’s world cup - "WITHOUT the hooligans and rabble-rousers who haunt the soccer stadiums," he quickly added.

The regatta was spread over five days, ending on Coronation Day, the fifth of May, with four days of highly-competitive racing for a total of 11 races. The committee held separate awards ceremonies for each day’s racing, the first comprising two and the second day consisting of four, after which the fleets were split into Championship Division and the Platu Division. The "finals" were sailed over the last two days.

Wind patterns remained fairly consistent for the duration of the regatta, blowing out of the south west, gradually increasing from a mid-morning 12 - 15 knots to a mid-afternoon capping 20 knots and shifting a little to the east later in the day. Seas were, to say the least, rather turbulent but, with clear skies, close, fiercely-competitive racing and professional race management, the regatta was a marvellous spectacle, from every point of view.

At the end of the first day’s racing, it was the Filipinos, with two straight wins, Warwick Downes (2,3), Thai team Mongkol T. Gultom, sailing under the aegis of the Junpaan Company (6,2) and David Race’s Phatra Yacht Club team (3,6), in first to fourth placings, respectively.

The second day was a long one for the sailors, with four races back-to-back, lots of excitement, great action and close racing, with seconds separating finishing craft.

By race three, with a wind gusting to 22 knots, the tri-coloured "T" flag went up at the windward rounding mark - no spinnakers the race committee decreed. As Viroj Nualkair remarked, "we have had enough broaches, Chinese gybes and other mayhem on the down-wind legs already. So, no spinnakers in these winds." For the moment, at least, the committee ruled the waves, though some participants decided to ‘waive the rules’ as several purple and green spinnakers appeared on the horizon. Swift justice was administered to the recalcitrant few.

With all four races counting, the Philippine team, with two firsts and a second placing, were obliged to carry a punitive "did-not-start" penalty of 21 points. Consistency carried the day, and David Race’s Phatra Yacht Club team, with a third and three fourth placings, took Day Two honours, from a rapidly-improving Pana Trungkabunch, also sailing for host club, second (8,7,1,1). The Philippine super stars were reduced to third place.

Then the REAL action started. The top 12 teams from Day Two went into the "Championship Division", while the other eight were relegated to the "Platu Division."

Three back-to-back triangular races saw incredibly close finishes with some hair-raising passes close to the committee vessel on station for the finish. In the final race of the day, the Coronation Cup champions finished third across the line. So, what’s so great about that? It so happened that the Championship Division started 10 minutes behind the Platu fleet. In a 55-minute race, then, Garcia’s team overhauled all but two of the earlier starters, finishing just one minute behind the winner of the Platu Division - and light years ahead of his rival Championship fleet.

Before the last (third) race of the day, the committee gave the weary sailors a lunch break, starting the last races at 15:50 and 16:00. There was another reason for this late start as well: high tide was due at 17:00 before which the yachts could not enter the Pran River estuary to motor the two kilometers upstream to the Phatra Marina. Better to be racing than sitting at anchor outside, the committee reasoned. It basically reversed the old adage "time and tide wait for no man": This time it was man waiting for the right time and the right tide.

Garcia’s team came out of the third day with an unassailable straight three wins, to Warwick Downes’ three second placings and Mark Haswell’s Manila Yacht Club team (4,5,3) for first to third places. Then followed Royal Thai Navy’s Verasit Puangnak and Phatra Yacht Club teams Pana Trunkabunchar and David Race, fourth to sixth.

In the Platu Division, Phatra’s Schle Wood, with two firsts and a third, was just one point ahead of Royal Varuna’s Peter Ole Herning (three straight second placings) and Lee Marine/Ao Chalong Yacht Club’s entry, Ian Coulson.

The two races of the final, fourth day, merely consolidated previously-established placings.

One of the many positive outcomes of this event was, in the words of Rear Admiral Prasart Sribhadung addressing the assembly at the awards ceremony, "the advent of the Farr Platu Racing Keelboat as a major yacht-racing medium in the region." This craft, the Rear Admiral added, "specifically designed for Thai people to sail in Thai waters, has now spread to many countries of Asia, as well as Europe and will be the catalyst for a rapid development of yacht-racing in our region."

Warwick Downes, a national champion in his own right, also sees a rapid deployment of the lively Platu as an ideal craft for intra- and even inter-regional competition.

Cheerut Sudasna, managing director of Phatra Marine Products, the company which has under-written the initial consignment of the new yacht into the Kingdom, was most enthusiastic at the end of the Coronation Cup. "We can expect burgeoning fleets within ASEAN and elsewhere and eventually world championships," Cheerut pointed out.

Finally, Rear Admiral Prasart acknowledged the generous ongoing support of the Boonrawd Company, "without which," he noted, "there simply would be no Coronation Cup." Phatra Thanakit and Phatra Marine Products also gave much support to this and other similar events.

As a footnote to sponsorship, a special mention should be made of such teams as that of the Lee Marine/Ao Chalong Yacht Club. Skipper Ian Coulson and his crew men Paul Bosanquet, Tony Knight, Brian Ritchie and Patsarn Misook drove up from Phuket, as they have done on many other occasions, to take part. A ‘shoe-string’ budget and support from Lee Marine, whose manager is totally dedicated to promoting yacht racing in the Kingdom, makes these fine fellows from Phuket determined to keep coming to the big events.

Not many people know that

With a ten year margin of error, when was chloroform first used in an operation? Who was the first archbishop of Canterbury?

During the hot month of May, bars in the trivial pursuits league are thrown back on their permanent expats to put up a good showing. The tourists are back in Europe working overtime in the salt mines to save up for their next trip to Sin City. The Rising Sun is the most favored as regards a permanent team with specialists dotted conveniently round the main categories of questions. But the average score this month across the bars is averaging about 70% which is a very creditable performance. Answers to the questions above are 1847 and Saint Augustine (not Thomas a Becket by the way).

Sunday Quiz Rising Sun Cheers Bob’s Mick’s Pleasure Dome Poteen Still Londoner Palmer’s Tippy’s Billy and Da Wednesday Quiz Cheers Rising Sun Rovers’ Return Sixties Bob’s Tommy’s Fawlty Towers Last Resort Palmer’s Billy and Da

659 points 639 616 612 599 587 575 552 519 497 15 credits 13 11 11 11 10 10 9 5 5

“Afterthoughts” bring home top team prize in

Pattaya Sports Club - Charity Classic 1998

Afterthoughts, a team made up of Ian Pike, Neil Hughes, Tom Kennedy and Brian Imrie, compiled an amazing 147 Stableford points to win the championship trophy for the 1998 PSC Charity Classic. Their winning margin was a full 4 strokes.

With the format enabling players to buy and use up to two Mulligans per hole, many astronomical scores were turned in on the day. This added to the excitement of the tourney, as many a high handicapper were able to post scores they could only dream about otherwise.

However, the true winners on the day were the many charities that will benefit from the tournament. The goals of the organizing committee were realized, and 210,000 Baht was raised to go to Banglamung Home for the Aged; Redemptorist School for the Blind; The Fountain of Life Children’s Center and Banglamung Schools Self-Help Food Project.

Team Prizes - (Aggregate Best 3 Stableford scores):
Winning Team: Afterthoughts: Ian Pike, Neil Hughes, Tom Kennedy, and Brian Imrie, 147 Points.
2nd Runners-up: Moonshine: George Davis, Larry Willet, Charles Davlin, and Ian Warwick, 143 Points.
3rd Runners-up: Four Stars: Ged Mason, Philippe Berra, Bernie Tuppin, and Mike Johnston (won on count-back), 140 Points.
4th Runners-up: Playboys: Gerard Lambert, Richard Holt, Niall McCarty, and Alan Laurie, 140 Points.

Best Individual Stableford Score: Doug Powell, 55 Stableford Points
Note: The Organising Committee regrets that, due to a mistaken computer entry, the 2nd Place Trophies were awarded to the Classroom Lost Links, who honourably pointed the mistake out at the end of the Trophy presentations.

Winner and 4th Places were not affected. However, Moonshine became Runners-up and in 3rd Place came the Four Stars. We apologise to the Four Stars, Moonshine and Classroom Lost Links teams for the error and inconvenience caused.

PSC Golf next week

The last week of May, starting Monday May 25th, offers a visit to Khao Kheow from PSC Golf Cafe Kronborg, or to Laem Chabang with the Splinter Golf Group, both Stableford competitions. On Wednesday the Splinter Golf Group goes to Noble Place while TAGGS from Hare House go to Bangpra. On Thursday the 28th we go to Green Valley from the Cafe Kronborg, and the week ends on Friday the 29th with tournaments at Green Valley for the Monthly Splinter Golf Group Medal sponsored by the Diana Group, and a visit to Siam Country Club from Hare House.

For more details of May fixtures visit the PSC Golf Web Site at www.pattayasports.org

Copyright 1998 Pattaya Mail Publishing Co.Ltd.
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Tel.66-38 411 240-1, 413 240-1, Fax:66-38 427 596; e-mail: [email protected]
Created by Andy Gombaz, assisted by Chinnaporn Sangwanlek.