Cameo by Rob M at Huntswood

To be honest I struggled to find the most appropriate title for this post. It could have been “Rob briefly lights up Huntswood” or perhaps “The Curse of the Ballbashers” or even “You could n’t make it up”.

Whatever the title, the facts of the matter are that Rob M turned up (unexpectedly according to Doodle (or expectedly if you want to think of it that way)) to play his first game as a fully-fledged member of the Ballbashers. The balls were thrown and he found himself in the second 3-ball out, playing with MikeS and myself.

His first drive off the tee was, as to be expected in the circumstances in front of an audience, a scuffed affair which travelled about 60 yards along the ground to the left of the fairway. No-one noticed the grimace of pain after this shot, or, if they did, they probably thought it was a standard RobM response to a duffed shot – not all of us cuss and swear or shout “Oh No!!”. But as Rob very stiffly played his second shot, he revealed that a muscle above his hip in his back had gone into spasm. He completed the hole and then thought that he might have a go at the very short 2nd.

Having struggled to get a tee into the ground, which was suddenly twice as far away as it had been, he put an excellent 9-iron onto the green and proceeded to par the hole which was a lot better than Mike or I achieved. But, by now, Rob was closely resembling C3PO in the way he moved and he decided to stop right there and go and seek an appropriate massage parlour. So beginneth and endeth Rob’s first outing.

Mike and I decided to man up and play the Best (or Only) 2 out of 3 for the rest of the competition. Given that I continued to exhibit a stunning mastery of erratic golf (Player Z even), this was not the most sensible of decisions but I dare say that was the same thought that went through the head of the cavalryman leading the Charge of the Light Brigade and they achieved ever-lasting fame – so on we went. Luckily MikeS was playing his usual standard of consistent golf so our team score on the front 9, although last, was at least in the same decile as everybody else.

On the second 9, I discovered that if I took about 2 feet or perhaps 45 deg off my back-swing, I was able to pivot round a bit better and actually have a follow-through. This took about 45 deg off my fade and I was able to add 18 points to Mike’s 20 on the back 9 and we thought that 38 might have a chance.

Of course we had not taken into account the make-up of the group ahead of us which comprised the in-form RobA, JohnH and Roger. Behind us were Nick, JohnT and Stuart.

The clubhouse being closed for re-decoration, Mike had the brainwave of going to the Feathers opposite Cliveden and more-over had the second brainwave of asking the non-playing but lunching PeterR to pop in to book a table. This turned out to be a brilliant idea as they have a fantastic lung menu and, being in a pub, we had to have a shandy at the minimum.

The denouement revealed that RobA and Co had scored 38 + 39 =77, Nick and Co had 35 + 36 = 71 and Mike RobM (briefly) and myself had 31 + 38 = 69. So RobA and Co took all the BashCoins.

Individually MikeS had 37, RobA 34, Nick 33, Roger and me 30, JohnH 29, JohnT 27, Stuart 23 and RobM 4.

Everybody enjoyed the Huntswood experience – the weather was kind, there was no mud to speak of and the course was in good condition and, to cap it all, the Feathers set a dangerous precedent.