I had a whole host of news to impart on you this week but I'm down in Newquay on holiday and my methods gone wrong. What I usually do to write this newsletter is have an email open during the week and add headings whenever they crop up and take pictures to remind me of what's happened, then expand on them.


 

Now I'm in holiday mode, with no Wi-Fi, the only thing I can remember is that 13 year old Hannah Golding won the ladies Club Championship after a stunning gross 73, nett 63 in the morning round and eventually won by more than 10 shots from Christine Davies. This gets Hannah's handicap down to single figures which I think puts her as the lowest handicap lady at Brocton alongside the Lady Captain?

Holly Hunt and Caroline Wilkins were battling it out for the better trophy on a very hot day and a firm course.


 

Of course I also remember the pro-am which was a huge success I'm glad to report, despite the fantastic weather breaking and is having pretty much constant rain. As chief organiser I can't thank everyone enough for their help and involvement including the PGA and especially the greens staff who presented a fantastic venue in a difficult week with a full diary.

The course held up superbly well under the conditions with three under par 66 being the winning score from James Freeman and Craig Swinburn with our own Luke Howe 3rd on 68. There were nine team prizes and seven of them were member's teams, unfortunately not the first prize as the last group in shot -21 and won.

Everyone was well looked after by the bar and catering staff and a special thank you to the Lady Captain and the lady members who operated the halfway house all day. Every year the ladies help in this way and it really wouldn't run as smoothly without you.

Of course my main thanks go to the sponsors and competitors who have made this a key showcase event in the Midlands and for the golf club and for the members who don't play for allowing a Friday to be given up for the day. I actually had to turn down three teams in the final week this year as it was getting too big to manage!

I've printed a list of the results, which can also be found on www.pga.info under the Midland Region tab and I've left some of the programmes on the counter, feel free to take one and check out the sponsor's adverts.

The only downside was I'd written the foreword in the programme and asked the winner not to say 'have a safe journey home' to wrap up their winners speech. The winning team obviously didn't read it so I'm thinking of banning them next year!


 

So, here's the pictures taken during the week and I'll try and remember what they were for: 

1. We now have two teenagers in the house as Simon had his 13th birthday on Wednesday - we had a football party at Rowley Park and yours truly played for all 90 minutes! (Okay - the last hour in goal). 

2. Lewis has been getting keen this summer and had a lesson booked every day last week but only needed the first one - that's the goal #nextballbetter. 

3. The second leg of the match against Beau was played at home on Saturday and we won by three matches which means we drew the series as we'd lost by the same amount away. The Captain played awesome in our match and as we were about to go 3 up on the 13th, Beau pro Barrie Stevens holed a near impossible bunker shot to an accompanying "HAVE SOME OF THAT!!!', before they proceeded to birdie the next 5 holes and beat us. 

This is the 'prize' to the losing Captain on each leg, a golf club head on a rope necklace with the brilliant inscription 


'Brocton Hall v Beau Desert 1981 Friendships last when each friend thinks he has a slight superiority over the other' 


What a perfectly clever summary of our clubs in a social sense and a business sense. 

4. A picture of me taken by our surf instructor from the Blue Surf School in Newquay. 

Oh actually this may not be me, I think the one of me would have been in the shallows demonstrating the surfing equivalent of a shank. 

Check out some of his other great pictures on Facebook at Daniel Cullen Surf Photography.