Parish & Brown set the pace

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Brian Parish & Karen Brown.
Brian Parish & Karen Brown.

PSC Golf from the Tropical Golf Group

Tuesday, April 3, Crystal Bay – Stableford

The greens today were in quite good shape, although not perfect, but once you were on them putting was quite reasonable.  The fairways too were in quite good condition with plenty of grass on them, probably due to the rain of late, but carts were allowed on the fairways which was a bonus over other courses we have played of late.

We teed off on C1 and the course was empty in front of us, allowing our leading 3-ball to zoom around and the 4-balls behind to do so at a good pace.  The B nine was next and this was also in good condition.

In the A Flight, 0 to 18, the winner was Brian Parish with 40 points on count-back over Takeshi Hakozaki in second place.  In third was Richard Kubicki with 38 points ahead of a count-back on 37 points that saw Andre Van Dyk in fourth and John Davis just missing out.

In the B Flight, 19 up, the winner was Karen Brown with 39 points ahead of Carol Kubicki with 36 in second.  In third was Nigel Perry with 35 points ahead of Dick Warberg in fourth with 34.

The front nine best score was 19 points by John Davis on count-back from Mashi, with and best back nine coming from Mick Coghlan with 18 points on count-back over Gordon Clegg.

Thursday, April 5, Pattavia – Stableford

On Thursday, eighteen golfers met at BJ’s Lodge to try their luck at Pattavia.  The number would have been higher but many were in Georgia hoping to get their last minute invitation to play in The Masters.  The rest took the drive out to Pattavia, which is not such an arduous journey as it used to be.

The course could be listed in good-to-very good condition.  There were no complaints about the fairways, and the usually ultra-slick greens were a little more manageable, though still difficult.  The only universal complaint was condition of the bunkers, with coarse gravelly sand making them quite difficult.  The other comment is ‘it’s that time of the year’, where endless buzzing fruit flies can make one want to scream at times.

Pattavia is usually a scoring course and this day was no exception.  If you didn’t at least match your handicap you were part of the audience, not part of the show.  In the A-Flight (0-19), John Davis (c/h 15) continued his long run of form, this time taking first place on count-back over Alan Sullivan (17) with 38 points.  Mashi Kaneta (16) rounded out his flight with 36 points.

In B-Flight (20+), Dave Cooper (27) had the high score of the day with a most excellent 39 points.  Graham Buckingham (22) had a fine 37 points, followed by Jim Ferris (25) with 36.

Karen Brown and Gordon Clegg had best non-winning 9-hole scores.