A late switch from Farnham, who were not allowing buggies, to Huntswood, who were, enabled 6 Ballbashers to turn out for a Novelty Game on a cool but mostly sunny day. The turf conditions at Huntswood are amazing compared to other local courses with a virtual absence of any worm-casts or clumps of mud – the greens might be a little slow but they are very green.
I had two options in mind for the format – a scramble or an evil multiplier game. Of course we went for the scramble and I had chosen the Florida format last played at Wareham on tour. All 3 players drive, choose the best position and the other 2 play from there and so on until the green is reached when all 3 putt. No player to have more than 8 drives selected and all players to have at least one tee-shot on a par 3 selected.
I had pre-selected the teams to balance the handicaps with the result that Mike, Roger and Bill were together with a team handicap of 18.5 (9.25 each half) and RobA, JohnT and I had a handicap of 17.5 (8.75 each half) or to simplify matters, we were giving them 1 shot split 0.5 and 0.5 on each 9 holes.
What ensued was a fun round of golf in which all 3 of us contributed important shots at critical times. Rob got us off to a great start with a 250 yard drive to the bottom of the hill below the 1st green and we disappointed to score a par and not a birdie. John sunk a monster putt from just off the 6th green to keep our par golf on a roll and I repeated that for a birdie on the 8th. We were unhappy with only scoring a 5 on the 9th, remembering that Nick had scored an eagle there, when we had played the hole well, virtually keeping to the top all of the way and seeing our opposition in all sorts of bother in the trees from where they apparently also scored a 5. Our gross score for the front 9 was 36 which we thought was not bad.
Despite our low score, we had been having problems with our approach putts – usually leaving them well short of the hole or, in compensation for the previous failing, hitting them well past. On the front 9 we had managed to sink some good recovery putts but, on the back 9, we did not do so well. In front of us, Mike et al seemed to be indulging in long discussions at times on ball selection. Unbeknown to us they were jammed up against the group in front who were equally held up by the group in front of them. We had hoped that their apparent tardiness was due to problems – this turned out not to be the case at all.
With the clubhouse not due to open until tomorrow, we forced ourselves to go to the Feathers where over a pint of this and that and an excellent lunch, the conversation ranged over a huge list of topics including Bill’s problems with a power cut on the coldest day of the year so far with no Oasis tribute band in sight to entertain the grandchildren.
The denouement revealed that Rob, JohnT and I had won the front 9 with 36 to their nett 38.5 but Mike, Roger and Bill had won the back 9 with a nett 37.5 our 41 and they had also won the overall with a nett 76 to our 77 – the one shot victory precisely matching the 1 shot we gave them on handicap. I don’t know whether to congratulate the DisHon Handicapping Sec or send him a brickbat!
