Monday, February 3rd
The Vintage Golf Club
1st Craig Dows (9) 38 points
2nd Steve Evans (15) 35 points
3rd Derek Riordan (25) 34 points
4th Ken Smith (27) 34 points
5th Colin Greig (14) 34 points
6th Hubert Stiefenhofer (16) 33 points
Near pins Mike Lloyd, Graham Davis, Richard Baldotto, & Derek Riordan.
We start a new month of golf with a trip up to Samut Prakan to play the Vintage club again. This time we paid the full fare, requesting another preferred rate would be stretching a friendship a bit too much, nevertheless at 2050 baht all infee was very reasonable for such a fine course. The drive to the course is always a bit of a grind and puts many people off, nevertheless we had a decent roll-up of twenty-six.
With no rain for at least three months many if not all courses are showing the effects of no water. Many places around the world would crave nice days like we had today but a good downpour would be very welcome here now.
A strong wind again today, of late we always seem to be playing in the wind. Apart from the winner, Craig Dows, scores were modest at best, it’s the second big score from Craig in a week, could he be back on his game again after several months with low scores.The rest of the leader was very tight as evident from the winners list. Near pins were spread around with four individuals taking one each.
Today’s game was played at a good pace with no hold ups anywhere, unfortunately it’s back to reality again on Wednesday with a game at The Emerald Course, let’s hope for a better day than last visit when we had four groups congregate on the first par three.
Wednesday, February 5th
Emerald
1st Paul Smith (5) 41 points
2nd Colin Greig (14) 37 points
3rd Craig Dows (9) 36 points
4th Rob Folland (15) 35 points
5th Ian Flannigan (21) 35 points
Near pins Paul Smith, Craig Dows, & Colin Greig X 2.
Happy to report that we had none of the delays we experienced on our last visit today, it was plain sailing all the way. The course is holding up reasonably well despite lack of rain although it had a shower during the night. The greens were again the biggest complaint, slow and rough, not a great combination.
A field of twenty-four were on hand so not too much waiting even for the last group to get away. Runaway winner today was Paul Smith who chipped in three times from off the green, forty-one points was a very good score on this course. A full four strokes back Colin Greig took second place with Craig Dows a stroke further back in third. A countback to resolve fourth and fifth with Rob Folland taking it with a superior last six holes. Near pins are as listed. A few of our better players had surprisingly low scores today, another had a fast start paring the first four holes only to fall in a heap thereafter, such is golf.
Friday, February 7th
Silky Oak
1st Rob Folland (15) 40 points
2nd Hubert Stiefenhofer (16) 40 points
3rd Craig Dows (8) 40 points
4th Mab Jiwa (18) 40 points
5th Stuart Tinkler (19) 36 points
Near pins Mab Jiwa, Hubert Stiefenhofer, Raleigh Gosney, Colin Greig, & Steve Evans.
An early tee time again for the game at Silky Oak where we had twenty-one players. Whilst the early tee time suits most people it doesn’t suit everybody as was the case today. One player who shall remain nameless turned up late and unannounced, even worse he had only one golf shoe with him, how that happened remains clouded in mystery, suffice to say if it happened at work he might be charged with malpractice.
People were full of praise for the course which despite no rain for months was in very nice condition, many expressed the view that they would like to play it more often.
Quite a unique situation in the winners circle with four players locked together on forty-points and separated on countback as listed above. The remaining place on the leaderboard went to Stuart Tinkler in his last game before returning home to the UK, a few comments were made about his nineteen handicap.
As there were five par threes today we had five near gins as listed and nicely shared around.
In recent weeks we have seen some very good scores from several players, clearly some are tuning up for The Memorial Trophy next week, many are dying to get their hands on the trophy just not with their own name on it. We look like a full house for this event, we even have a couple on standby in case of a cry off, or possibly enough to fill another team
Winner at The Vintage, Craig Dows
Winner at Emerald, Paul Smith.
Winner at Silky Oak Rob Folland.