Course maintenance

Next week we have the essential course maintenance taking place from Monday. It always seems a shame when the greens are so good to perform the routine but the hollow-tining and top-dressing process is vital to promote healthy greens and pure surfaces long term. Last year the greens were fully recovered in 2 weeks so hopefully the weather will be kind to us again and we’ll see a similar scenario. The course remains open all week but some greens will be out pf play at random times and please allow the green staff full priority at all times.

Tuesday Social

49 golfers played the Tuesday social this week with Rich Nicholls winning on 20 points. Full scores can be found on the Facebook page. The Social golf will still go ahead next week.

Click here to view the results on the Facebook page.

Bruton final

The men’s Bruton matchplay final was a family affair on Bank Holiday Monday with Uncle and Nephew, Malcolm and Mark Ferguson battling it out in glorious conditions. Mark was 2 up after 6 holes but Malcolm finished the front 9 the same number of holes ahead and eventually closed out 4&3 to be the winner. Most of the family were out on the course to watch and there was even some videoing occurring

Men’s match v Leek golf club

The away leg of this 31 year old challenge for the Claret Jug ended in Brocton’s favour as we won both home and away games amassing 15.5 points compared to 7.5. The Captain and I had a great 36 hole game against the Captain from Leek, Phil Davies, and their pro Greg Rogula as we had halved the game at Brocton. We went down 2&1 at Leek but it turned out to be good team practice for us as we then won our Captain Pro match on the 18th green against a tough pairing (aren’t they all!!) of Tim Nicholls and Ian Carlton the very next day.

European Deaf Golf Championships

Rich Le Page has been competing in the European Deaf Golf Championships at Ganton golf club, which is a very tough test of golf. Many of the fairway bunkers have steps down into them and the balls get collected into them from seemingly good drives. Good luck Rich!

Summer update

The Juniors are at it again with some impressive scoring and handicap reductions, Ellie Treadwell is now down to 11 from 27 at the start of the year and Owen Mills won the junior medal last week after previously winning the Junior Open and competing in our Pro-Am a couple of weeks ago. For many golfers the constant wonder as to whether they’ll ever get a hole-in-one is underpinned by the thought that surely the must get one eventually! Well, 12 year old Ben Collier won’t have that sensation to ponder as he scored an ace on the 3rd hole last week! He achieved the feat using an 8 iron - well done Ben!

Junior coaching

The new series of junior coaching starts on Saturday 16th September running every Saturday for 6 weeks until half term - 21st October. There are currently two session, 10:00am - 11:00am for improving juniors playing off blue or red tees and 11:15am - 12:00pm for younger, beginner juniors. The costs are £48 for the 10:00am course and £36 for the 11:15am course.

I also have a Monday evening session running from 4:30pm - 5:30pm running from 18th September for 5 weeks at a cost of £40 for the improving juniors. If you would like to enrol a young Rory or Lexi for either of these courses, please click the link below.

CONGU handicap juniors (girls playing off red tees and boys playing off white tees) fare better from individual coaching and the cost of this is minimal as well - just £10 for a half hour lesson which can be booked for whatever time suits you. As we progress into the winter months, this is also a great time to have some coaching indoors on the simulator and keep in touch with the game.

Click here to book any of the sessions or an individual lesson.

Cavendish

I had a day playing at my favourite UK course this week, Cavendish in Buxton, Derbyshire, with my favourite golfers - Lewis and Simon. I’m happy they’ve got back into golf this year after a few years away and they’ve been dead keen this summer. Simon’s competing off the white tees now and Lewis put a supplementary card in last week of 43 points and got docked 5 whole shots - 20% off his handicap!!

Pro’s Day and BBQ

Date for your diary - Pro’s Day and Party night is 23rd September. Bring along your gazebos, marquees, Transporter vans, motorhomes - anything that you can set up on the lawn outside the dining room and we’ll have an outdoor party with a band and a BBQ to celebrate 15 years at the club and utilise the patio space overlooking the lake. There’ll be a sheet up in the clubhouse to book your places and you can click here and let me know how many of you are looking.