Last updated on March 29, 2025
On Wednesday it was time for another of Ashley’s epicurean competitions in which the winners normally stagger home with a carrier bag full of whatever regional delights Tesco’s or Lidl are focussed on at the time. Buying such prizes is rendered more problematic by the impossibility of knowing precisely how many BBs are going to be fit to play on the day and thereby whether or not teams of 2 or 3 players have to be accommodated – we do not want to see a trio of BBs squabbling over a pack of spaghetti. So Ashley took the only sensible course open to him and provided prizes based on wine, ensuring that the wine he bought would be enjoyed by Michelle and himself if any was surplus to requirements.
Very wise as it turned out as our numbers went from 10 to 9 and finally to 8 on the day. So we were four teams of 2 – Ashley & PeterR, Bill & MikeS, RobA & myself and Alan & JohnS. It is always good to see JohnS out on the golf course because you know that Spring is upon us with the new year’s flora and fauna to be inspected in remote locations on the course. And Wednesday did not disappoint weather-wise with wall-to-wall sunshine which had us occasionally in shirt sleeves regretting that we had not dug out the ambre solaire.
They have made some truly masochistic changes to the layout at Huntswood – the first one being the pair of extra ponds located right across the front of the 1st green and two of our number duly went into the water. If only I could remember to take my ball-fisher-out-of-water device with me to Huntswood I could keep us in balls for the season.
The 2nd hole is a total conundrum – it is just a short Par 3 but it seems impossible to hit the tee-shot anywhere else but out on the right, out on the left or into the bunker which runs right across the front. The 4 of us discussed this problem before we proved it once again by myself going way right, JohnS going left and Rob into the bunker. Alan then declared that he was having no truck with this defeatist talk and would go for it in no uncertain fashion. He then totally topped his ball and it travelled about 10 yards forwards. Those of us who had gone to the right then discovered that somebody in the green-keeping squad had taken pity on us and added several extra yards on the green on that side – anti-masochistic I suppose.
I managed to par the first 4 holes and I was day-dreaming about maybe going round the whole course in scratch when I missed 3 short putts and then scored a blob on the 8th and the daydream was shattered. Luckily my partner stepped into the breach and we reached the turn with 23 points to our immediate opposition’s 16. We had some problems with the mental arithmetic before we agreed that our lead was 7 – Alan was particularly keen to establish the precise number.
Rob and I discovered very quickly why this was, as they totally turned the tables on us. On the front 9 – after 5 holes we had 15 points to their 9. On the back 9 – after 5 holes they had 14 to our 8 and our lead was cut to just 1 point. By now JohnS had applied WD40 to all the areas of his game which were unsurprisingly a touch rusty after a winter away from the fairways and Alan was not giving up without a serious fight. His 4 for 4 points on the 13th versus our measly 2 points almost led to a re-telling of the Battle of Bannockburn.
Luckily for Rob and myself, something more like Culloden emerged on the last 3 holes and we were able to extend our lead to 3 points by the time we came off the 18th,on which hole they had both put their balls into the lake adorning the left-hand side of the route to the hole.
The 8 of us enjoyed refreshments on a sunny terrace during which time Peter was quizzed as to why Heathrow only appeared to have one adaptor cable to run the whole airport – we must remember to redress the balance by thanking him every time we get through security in under an hour!
Team scores were revealed to be very close as usual:
RobA & Richard 23 + 17 = 40
Bill & MikeS 21 + 17 = 38
Alan & JohnS 16 + 21 = 37
Ashley & PeterR 18 + 17 = 35
The NPin2 golf balls were won by Alan, JohnS and Richard – helped in no small part by the 1st group forgetting on which holes these were being played for.
Rob and I departed happy with our bottles of white Burgundy and Australian Shiraz – the latter with the curious name of Two in the Bush which led to some questioning over precisely what this referred to, the wine producer being called A Bird in the Hand.
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