After a heavy overnight frost, the greens at Little Aston staunchly resisted the winter sun’s ministrations, remaining white over and solid for the day. Thus proving that occasionally, in winter golf, the weather tries to beat us - It had a damn good try on Wednesday but it was foiled by the flogs at Little Aston.
For those unfamiliar with this phenomenon, flogs are 18-inch diameter logs with flags in them. They are Little Aston’s answer to temporary greens. During the winter months they are kept at the side of each fairway, in the trees, and rolled out, just short of the main green, whenever it is frosty.
In order to hole out, one must hit the log with the ball. For most of the players it was their first experience of playing to flogs. However, once they have mastered the technique of a firm straight putt, aimed straight at the log, they realised terrific results. And they were much admired by many, who intended to report back to their home club, the benefits of not wasting green keeping time preparing temporary greens, that no one enjoys playing. They also make for a much quicker winter round.
Will Thompson was a late entry and, as he was on his own, I played with him. As the field was only 50 players, Will and I started on the ninth and were round in 2hrs 50 minutes.
We had one Proscore, which was only needed on three holes. We were going along nicely with an average 5 points per hole, making 45 points on the first nine and prompting Will to speculate that there may be 100 points recorded by some team or other. How wrong was he - we were the only team that DIDN’T get at least 100 points!!
Last time the flogs were played on a Teetours event, I made the mistake of including twos in the prizes, resulting in a hasty and unscheduled visit to the wine merchant to re-stock! This time, the twos were excluded but a 60% refund was given to all players. The result was a super day of fun golf in some welcome winter sunshine.
The average handicap on the day was 11.82 - pretty good for a golf society.
|
Pos |
Team |
Points |
O.O.M. |
|
1 |
Stuart Bond 12 Kevin Marlow 7 Neil Brannigan 5 Peter Bryant 6 |
115 |
12 |
|
2 |
Aidan Travers 13 Graham Johnson 5 Ian Jones 13 Nick Turner 12 |
113 |
10 |
|
3 |
Peter Douglas 15 Andy Shaw 16 Mark Geal 18 Philip Ufton 16 |
110 |
8 |
|
4 |
John Langley 7 Mike Broster 8 Dave Ross 13 Mike Hamilton 13 |
107 |
6 |
|
5 |
John Kidney 15 Matt Cuthbert 0 Nigel Ward 9 Matt Wardle 10 |
105 |
4 |
|
6 |
Harry Adair 7 John Walker 10 David Chesney 21 Ian Watson 12 |
105 |
2 |
|
7 |
Tim Evans 14 Ian Carter 9 Alan Topping 18 Ade Spencer 9 |
105 |
|
|
8 |
Gary Ferrar 13 Pat Shaw 21 Dave Pye 24 Ali Grimsley 10 |
105 |
|
|
9= |
Mike Remington 10 Marvin Cook 9 Steve Hemmings 13 Mitchell Green 13 |
104 |
|
|
9= |
Dean Pointon 10 Roy Everett 8 Dave Brierley 9 Darron Henn 6 |
104 |
|
|
9= |
Kevin Rhodes 12 Bill Bingham 13 Sam Pearce 8 Steve Champion 16 |
104 |
|
|
12 |
Terry Hill 17 Robert Hill 16 Mark Davis 14 Andrew Flood 16 |
102 |
|
|
13 |
Will Thompson 5 Tony Bishop 15 |
89 |