UK Summer Cup 2018

[TheDoctor]

Well, it was a fun couple of days as always, and the weather held up until almost the end of the round on Sunday, but we couldn't complain about it to be honest

I have no doubt that there will be some pics to follow (I know I need to go through my phone to sort some out) but in the meantime here is a quick review of how the 2 days went

5am alarm for us on Saturday and then once Anne and Andrew arrived we set off to head north of the border with a stop at Jedburgh for some breakfast before continuing up to Dalmahoy

There was the usual meet and great as people arrived, with a couple grabbing some lunch before heading out for the first tee time at 13.30

We were playing the usual format with individual stableford scores, full handicap allowance and totalling the scores from both days to give the overall winner

Despite the dry weather, the wind at times caused a few issues - and that is what I am blaming for my snap hook OOB on the 1st tee.....nothing to do with a bad swing on my part
I also managed to hit my second ball OOB as well but that one was a combination of the right to left wind compounded by a nice bounce left when it landed

Not quite the start I wanted as the holder of the trophy from last year.....

The West course that we played on Saturday is the shorter course, and to be honest I think a lot of us could have scored better if we had known the layout as there was almost no need for a driver - you could have hit a lot of irons off the tee to put you in position for a shot at the green

If I was to be brutally honest, the greens were not up to the standards I was expecting, they were very hard and not receptive at all, so with pin positions mainly at the front of the green it became almost impossible to get near some of them - although those very familiar with links golf might have fared a lot better running the ball up to the front of the green when it wasn't protected by a bunker

At the end of day 1 the scores were very close at the top of the leaderboard with only 6 points separating the top 8 players, meaning that there was still a lot to play for on day 2

We also played the North v South team game as well, which was simply the combined total of all stableford scores for each team, and at the end of day 1 the north were leading by only 11 points, so this too was very close

After the evening meal I announced the groups for the Sunday morning and handed out the prizes for both Longest Drive and Nearest the Pin

Longest Drive - this actually went to myself as I obviously got a favourable bounce to beat Colin by probably about 12 inches, and I still rue not taking a picture of where my ball finished as it was about 2ft left of the marker that Colin had set

Nearest the Pin - this went to Damien who stuck one pretty close, although after the comments on the day 2 nearest the pin, I am wondering if he actually mis-hit the ball to have it finish as close as it did (I will explain later )

So at the end of day 1, the leaderboard looked like this

Chas - 40 points
Andrew - 39 points
Damien - 38 points
Ian - 37 points
Lina - 35 points
Anne-Sofie - 35 points
Colin - 34 points
Glenn - 34 points
Simon - 33 points
Sam - 33 points
Stu - 31 points
Linus - 30 points
Tom - 29 points
Kris - 27 points

As you can see, at the top of the leaderboard it was very close and the final 4-ball of Chas / Andrew / Damien / Ian were all going to be able to see how each other was doing

Following the prizes and the announcement of the groups for Sunday, the banter continued to flow until we were actually asked by the restaurant staff if we could move to allow them to finish preparing the area for breakfast the next morning, so we all moved to one of the lounge areas until people decided it was time to turn in for the night

Day 2 to follow.......

 

[GEO375]

Thanks again for organising Glenn, another cracking weekend
(My first post on here for I don’t know how long? )


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[casuk79]

Really enjoyed my weekend, good golf and good company, thanks again Glenn, looking forward to next year already

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[mikedean441]

Looking forward to some more pics!

 

[TheDoctor]

Bunch of the pics I had on my phone with the hotel, putting green and a selection of first tee shots from Sunday

You could guess that Sam was pleased with his...

I know Jen had more first tee pics on her phone and I will see what I can grab from the group chat

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[Almdudler]

Well I'm home and already had an 11 hour work day! Thanks everybody for a fantastic week! Here's some random photos during the weekend for you!

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[TheDoctor]

A few more pictures

Groups on the 1st tee on day 1
The random headcovers for the girls
A picture of me on the 9th green on Sunday holding the flag whilst Anne-Sofie was putting (courtesy of Lina)
The long drive headcover prizes

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[TheDoctor]

Day 2

After a breakfast including haggis and black pudding, it soon became time to head for the 1st tee ready for our second day of competition and see who the trophy would end up with

Once again, I made a mess of my tee shot (I really need to hit a few balls to loosen up before getting to the tee.....) but as it was an uphill par 5 I still had a chance to try and salvage something out of the hole and finished with a bogey which, considering the tee shot, was definitely acceptable

Things then picked up and I started hitting the ball well off the tee with driver, so I decided regardless of the hole layout I was going to hit driver whenever I could and it seemed to work quite well

We had a little bit of a laugh when we came to the par 3 that was being used for our Nearest the Pin challenge as the ladies tees were actually further back than the mens tees - at which point I almost had a problem in my group as I was in the group with both of them..... (there is a pic somewhere I will hunt out) and let me tell you they weren't happy about it!!!!!

After the front 9 I had actually pulled back a number of points as I had scored 22 points and Colin had scored 20, and we later found out that the final group all had either 17 or 18 points so it had become very close at that point

On the back 9 there were 2 tricky holes, the 13th and 14th, that were very tight par 4's with trouble to the right on both of them - I managed to negotiate both holes fairly well, but Colin failed to score any points on either of them and that put paid to his challenge for the trophy this year

Next up was the 15th which was being used for our Longest Drive challenge and Colin came within a yard or so of pinching this from Simon, but he just didn't get enough roll-out to get beyond the marker that Simon had set. I pulled my tee shot left and caught the rough so came up short, but that is where my problems began

I had a slightly awkward lie with a tree to clear in front of me and needed a slight draw to get the ball to the middle of the green (pin was tucked left side behind a bunker) so I pulled an 8i as I had almost 160yds to the back of the green and figured I would be either just short or front edge of the green based on the lie

However, a flyer had the ball clear the green and bounce into the bushes behind the green and at that point I had no idea if I would find the ball or not, but when getting there I not only found the ball but I also had a small gap that I was able to stab a club at the ball and get it back out. Unfortunately I didn't make it on to the green, chipped on and 2 putted for a double bogey and only 1 point

But at least it was still a point I thought, and that was when the rain decided to start

16th hole - a simple looking par 4 and I put my tee shot in the right half of the fairway, but then made a terrible second shot and put my ball into the greenside bunker, clipped the ball too cleanly off the sand and flew the green, made a mess of the chip and 2 putted for another double bogey and 1 point

17th hole - a 181yd par 3 called 'The Wee Wrecker' which was where the wheels completely fell off the wagon for me. I pulled my tee shot into one of the left greenside bunkers leaving me short-sided so I just wanted to get the ball on the green. After catching the previous bunker shot too clean I took a bit too much sand and the ball just made it to the top of the slope and was literally an inch from being perfect and rolling down towards the flag, but instead rolled back into the bunker and nestled amongst a lot of stones right under the lip. It then took a couple of shots to even get the ball out of the bunker due to the stones and I finished up by not scoring any points on that hole

18th hole - For some reason, when I was stood on the tee I mistakenly assumed this was a long par 4 so thought I needed to hit a couple of perfect shots to try and recover some points. I promptly pulled my tee shot left into the trees so hit a provisional and put that almost in the same spot, but when walking up to the trees I actually found both of them within a few yards of each other, so I chipped out sideways to the middle of the fairway to try and give me a shot at the green. Why I decided to try and hit my 3W after the earlier shots with it I will never know, but I topped it straight into the waste/water and had to drop a ball just short of the hazard

So I am now playing my 5th shot from nearly 200yds and I still hadn't realised the hole was a par 5 so I thought I needed to get up and down to salvage a point, but then pushed my shot into the greenside bunker. It wasn't until we got to the bunker that I said to Colin that I needed to hole the bunker shot for a point that he said he thought the hole was a par 5......and when I looked at the card....sure enough, a par 5 to finish

Regardless of this fact, I still didn't get up and down from the bunker and walked off the final hole without scoring another point, so in the last 4 holes I only scored 2 points and I was pretty certain that I wouldn't be keeping the trophy this year, and wouldn't have been surprised to not even feature in the top 3 overall

Final results to follow

 

[will_i_dream]

Well I’m still recovering from all the golf I have been playing, aches and pains aplenty.

Wednesday, I had the pleasure of Almdudlers company at my home course. I gave him the whistle stop tour of Dundee and then on to the course for a leisurely round of golf. I warned him about the railway line and out of bounds but he still insisted on going in that direction ��

Thursday back to work.

Friday and it was a pleasant drive across to North Berwick, just down the coast from where the Scottish Open was taking place at Gullane. Met up with the troops, exchanged pleasantries and had a photo opportunity. See above in Almdudlers photo montage. After a fun round of golf and post golf banter it took a little longer than expected to get home, detours and bridge works conspiring against me.

Then it was good to catch up with everyone again at Dalmahoy just outside Edinburgh on Saturday and Sunday. I brought my golf game with me this time, 37pts on Sat and I had 18pts on the front 9 on Sunday. I then jumped on the number 5 train and couldn’t get off anywhere on the back 9, that put paid to my title challenge. I did however put my 8 iron to a couple of feet for the nearest the pin competition.