Hi golfers,

Welcome to another edition of your weekly news. The weather was kinder to us last week and the speed in which the course recovered was very encouraging. We’ve had more bad weather this week which is again frustrating but we are half way through January already.

Enjoy the read.

Your weekly Tour report

Three to report on this week starting with the Eurasia cup. Thomas Bjorn’s warm up to the main event in Paris later on this year was just what he needed. A superb team performance, 3/3 wins for young Englishmen Hatton and Fleetwood and some experienced performances from the likes of Fisher and Stenson culminated in a win for the Europeans against a strong Asian team.

Chris Paisley thought he would give his wife a chance to caddy for him in the South African Open down at Glendower, this proved to be the second best decision he has ever made, after marrying her of course, as he held off the threat of serial winner in South Africa Branden Grace.

The Sony Open in Hawaii was littered with stars who were all hoping to start their season off with a ‘W’, if Justin Thomas could have used his putter as well as the rest of his clubs then he would have breezed it, pardon the pun, it was however his fellow countryman Patton Kizzare who lifted the trophy.

Jim takes top spot

Thursday was the first Seniors winter Stableford of 2018, Jim Rymer took top spot with 37 points beating Martin Higby, Bob Mottershead and Brian Edwards on countback. In the 12 hole Stableford running alongside, Bob Mottershead’s 26 points was the winner, Jim Rymer was second with 25, third with 24 was John Trott.

The right equipment helps!

The informal was back on Saturday with 65 players competing across the Blair and Kenrick leagues, and Ben Kelly was the victor with a very impressive 40 points. It was a day for keeping the wind out and with a newly acquired piece of windstopper technology on, Chris Dhenin couldn’t feel it on his way to 39 points in second. The right equipment makes all the difference, although in third place, wearing his shorts, was Jamie Lloyd with 37 points.

Some choose to brave the wind

There was a choice on Tuesday for the ladies, 18 holes, 12 holes or seek refuge in the clubhouse, with a biting wind the majority chose the third option. But the 26 who did brave it, however, all chose just to play 12.

The results are as follows:

• First place, Thea Cornford - 22 points 
• Second place, Tam Allen - 20 points
• Third place, Barb Garratt - 19 points
• Fourth place, Theresa O’Neill - 18 points
• Fifth place, Kath Grainger - 17 points
• Sixth place, Sue Banks - 16 points

The year ahead in-store

With each new year comes new arrivals into the shop. This year we are looking to do things a little differently.

For the first time there won’t be lots of stock of ‘standard’ clubs on the shelves. 90% of hardware is now being custom fitted so this is how we plan to work. Come in for a fitting on PING, Titleist or Benross clubs, and you will get a spec that suits you which can then be transferred to another brand if you so wish. Your fitting will be chargeable but this will be knocked off the price of any clubs that you purchase.

In 2017 we were in the top 10 in the country for fitted clubs with Titleist and we were top of the list with Benross.

Clothing will be similar, our collections from PING, FootJoy and Galvin Green will be arriving in smaller quantities but more often so as to maximise your choices.

On the range

The decision to keep the range open throughout the winter has proved popular, only twice have we run out of balls due to sheer volume of traffic and once have we had to close it as the balls were all frozen together.

Don’t forget though that in the unlikely event that the machine won’t dispense balls, you have a range card, and it’s safe to do so please feel free to pick up balls and re hit them.