A Great Weekend For New And Old!

Well I hope you're sitting comfortably as I have a great deal to report from a wonderful Captain's Drive-in weekend. My apologies as circumstances dictated that I wasn't able to get this report out to you hot off the press last weekend.

So the weekend kicked off with The Men's Club Supper on Friday night, a black tie affair with guest Captains from all our local clubs. The food was fantastic, the wine flowed and we discovered the hidden talents of our new after dinner speaker/stand-up comedian who did a fantastic and very funny job to close the formalities upstairs. However, this was then followed by the traditional carrying in off the outgoing Captain, who is a big chap so I'm pleased for my back I wasn't asked to be one of the load bearers. All in all it was a cracking night with a few sore heads to prove it in the morning.

Saturday is the official day with the AGM being held in the evening, although we did move the start back due to the rugby, but the less said about that the better. I also on Saturday enjoyed my very last Captain and Pro Challenge which kicked off on the first tee in the best possible way… with a bottle of Champagne! We took on the incoming Captain and Mr David Barrowes, who very kindly stood in for the President Anne Smith. I'll never forget the classic words from Mr Barrows on the first tee, who had just flown in from Spain and had not played much golf of late; "my apologies David as I'll probably not be much help today"… and then proceeded to birdie the first two holes! Two down, terrific.We had a wonderful round and the incoming Captain played great going two under (gross) through 16 which was enough for us as they took the victory 4&3. Well played gents and that was enough for them to take the annual Captain and Pro Challenge Trophy. 

I would like to take this opportunity to personally thank our now past Captain Adrian Northeast. It has been a wonderful year and I have thoroughly enjoyed all of our matches and both Adrian and Sally should feel very proud of the incredible total of over £11,000 that they have raised for their joint charity, Shooting Star Chase Children's Hospice. Thank you both for a great year!

The AGM was very well attended as always and went through smoothly without too many issues and concluded with the new Men's and Ladies Captains being unanimously voted in. So congratulations to Sue pickard and David Barnett, our new Captains.

   

Captains' Drive-in Sunday is always kicked off in the morning with one of the biggest men's competitions, The Garrett Cup. A huge field headed out to battle in very blustery conditions, but the man who tamed the wind to take one of Epsom's 'Majors' was none other than Past Captain, Mr Roy Chegwin. Roy posted a superb nett 68 which was good enough to beat another Past Captain John Chard on countback.

We also had some other presentations to make on Sunday, firstly The Victor Ladorium. This is a trophy won by the most consistent golfer over the entire year, worked out from all the statistics of all the competitions in the calendar year and this year's champion was Mr Richard Halifax.

   

The final presentation of the day was the Men's Winter League Trophy, which this year was played over nine rounds of differing formats and went right down to the wire with only a few points separating the top three pairs Coming out on top however was the formidable partnership of Stan Arnot and Ray Williams. Very well played gentleman, its takes a great deal of good golf throughout the winter to take this title.

Finally, the big event of the weekend, the time to make it all official... The Drive-in. Now I'm not sure how many of you have had to stand there and hit a driver in front of over 100 people, but I can assure you it can be a little nerving if you haven't done it before. However, these three golfers stepped up and made it look like they had been doing it for years. Maybe with a little Dutch courage from the bar! First up stepped our Junior Captain Ben Partridge who launched one up the middle. Not to be outdone, our Lady Captain confidently marched up and without a flinch sailed a a lovely drive off into the distance. So, two great drives down, could our new men's Captain make it a hat-trick… of course he did. He put a lovely short (he'll know what I mean) swing on it a nailed his brand new TaylorMade M2 driver (available in store) a whopping 266 yards almost up on to the 17th green. A massive drive under the pressure. All three great shots deserved all the applause they received from 'The Gallery'.

   

 

Fancy Representing The Club And Challenging The Captain And Pro?

The Captain has asked me to mention to you that if any of you chaps fancy representing the club in any one of our club matches against some of our local clubs, please head to the men's competition board and add your names to the lists provided.

I have also put up this year's Captain and Pro Challenges, so if you fancy your chances against myself and David, head to the Professional's board and add you and your partners name to the list provided. The format is betterball matchplay, played from the plates with a few charity bets thrown in for good measure. We look forward to your challenges.