Hello again golfers and welcome to another red hot newsletter - just like the weather! It's been another busy week here both on and off the course and the Open Championship at Troon was also a great spectacle with a popular first time winner in Henrik Stenson.
In this week's news:
- King Henrik reigns at Royal Troon
- Did you win in our Open sweepstake?
- Tim and Steve are the top Stags
- Our ladies do their bit for charity
-Have you traded an old shirt in yet?
- Upcoming events
What a tournament we had this year at Royal Troon for the Open Championship, it ended up being a shootout between two of the world's best players who dominated from the start and were playing at the absolute peak of their abilities. Phil Mickelson had edged out Henrik Stenson three years ago at Muirfield to lift the Claret Jug, but this year it was a different Henrik he was up against and over the final two rounds the Swede showed an ice cold temperament and a steely resolve as well as a magical 3 wood and putter. Early on the pair traded birdies and we knew we were in for something special - there was never more than one shot between them from when they started the third round together until the 69th hole of the tournament when Stenson holed a long putt for his third birdie in a row to go two shots clear, this was a huge blow to Mickelson and when Stenson's tee shot on 18 avoided a fairway bunker by a matter of feet he knew that the Claret Jug was his as he shot a 63 to Mickelson's final round 65. It was an historic victory - the lowest winning total at the Open (20 under par) and the lowest final round to win a major, and a role reversal from the 2013 Open.
It's hard to remember a last round when two players hit some many good shots under pressure, if they were playing betterball Stenson and Mickelson would have shot 59 - an unbelievable score considering the rest of the world's best players were struggling to beat par! Comparisons have been made between this last round and the famous duel in the sun between Jack Nicklaus and Tom Watson, on that day Watson shot 65 to Nicklaus's 66, so from a scoring point of view this battle at Troon was even better. Nicklaus himself summed up proceedings pretty well on his Facebook page, 'Phil played one of the best rounds I have seen played in the Open and Henrik just played better - he played one of the greatest rounds I have ever seen'. Pretty high praise from the world's best ever player and well done Henrik on being the first Open Champion from Sweden.
The USPGA Championship is coming up soon at Baltusrol on 28th July and after the Open drama it has a lot to live up to!
Open Sweepstake winners
Well done to our Open sweepstake winners, they are as follows:
Jonno Ness - £85 of shop vouchers
Chris Bird - £35 vouchers (hope you're having fun in Florida Chris!)
Paul Underwood, James Eaton and Dave Watkins - £10 voucher each
Well done guys and your vouchers are in the shop waiting for you!
Hartford Stag Trophy Review
The Hartford Stag was played on Sunday morning and the course was in fantastic condition, the greens were quick and there were some tricky pin positions - as a result it was the first competition in a good while where there was a full field and nobody could break par. In the Stag Trophy we have two divisions split into handicaps, in division one for the low handicappers the winner was Tim Barnes on nett 70 - this was Tim's first victory of the season and he had a funny round as he only had one bogey in his entire round but he had four double bogeys!
In second place in division one was Dave Johnson who returned from holiday in good form with a nett 71, third place went to Club Champion Steve Bond on nett 72.
In Division Two the winning score was also nett 70 and it was Steve Holehouse that took the victory, Steve is in a purple patch and his last three results have now been first, second, first - we're sure that the Handicap Secretary will be keeping a close eye on him! Second place went to Steve Nicholson who also scored 70 but lost on a countback and in third place was Patrick Scanlan on nett 72.
It will be quiet at the club this weekend as Captain Paul Underwood is taking a group of members on his away weekend at Forest Pines, have fun everyone!
Shirt Amnesty still going strong
Our bin full of old shirts on the counter is now over flowing! In case you've missed it we've declared a shirt amnesty, bring an old shirt in and trade it in against £10 OFF the price of any new shirt in the shop, we have some great collections in at the moment from FoyJoy, adidas, Nike, PING, Galvin Green and Under Armour.
We'll take any old shirt off you and the deal runs throughout July so you still have plenty of time to take advantage, for a bit of fun we will give a prize to the person who trades in the worst old shirt, so dig out your most garish shirt and trade it in now for a nice new one and you could also win a good little prize!
The final of the ladies Spring Knockout was played on Tuesday between Jean Clare and Sandra Peake, they played in very hot conditions and their golf was also pretty hot!
The winner was Jean who had a 'magic putter' in her own words - just like Henrik Stenson! She holed a few long putts which made all the difference and closed out the match on the 16th hole, well done Jean.
Last Thursday the ladies played their annual Charity Day 9 hole Texas Scramble, the winning team were Chris Lever, Pam Till and Alison Worrall on nett 30, in second place were the team of Jill Bebbington, Judith Flower and Sandra Peake on nett 31.
The main aim of the day was to raise some funds for this years chosen charity - the Alzheimer's Society and we'll let you know in the next week or two how much was raised on the day.
This Sunday it's the Ladies Club Championship starting at 1pm.
- Ladies Club Championships - Sunday 24th July 1pm
- Seniors 18 hole Stableford - Tuesday 26th July 9:16am
- Ladies Summer Stableford - Thursday 28th July 9:24am
- Rhys' Tennessee Scramble - Saturday 30th July 10:04am