Thank you John Pierrpoint

A quick paragraph of praise to the green keeping team at Stamford Golf Club. I've just walked off the course after 18 holes in a friendly game following the cancellation of the Manchester Alliance at a water logged venue. Bearing in mind we are in the second week of February, our Golf Course was maintained to a standard I would expect to see in April/May. Firm Greens rolling extremely well with good pace, well maintained bunkers, paths being up-kept and developed and green staff buzzing around on different tasks. 

I've left the club this evening excited that the season is just around the corner and we are more than prepared for its arrival. Only two weeks until the Captains drive-in on Saturday, 25 February and we will officially be into the 2017 season. 

John Pierrpoint and your crew, congrats and thank you on behalf of all the members and visitors of SGC.


 

It's getting exciting....

The extremely popular and coveted winter league is 11 weeks in with week 12 just 3 days away. We have seen 3 league leaders so far and only one player winning on multiple occasions ( Chris Exton). The new handicapping cull is proving its worth and something I want us to be proud off. Local clubs are taking to social media in frustration of a poor handicapping system, the very system we have left. We have had numerous winners, over 100 handicap reductions and generated from it, a fairer playing field.

A fairer playing field provides us with a winter league which is pretty wide open as we move into week 12. The serious contenders reaching their maximum of eight scores and from there the league has started to take real shape. Competitors such as Wayne Morris, Steve Lennon, Ian Grimsditch, Neil White and Alan Hood are all holding a game in hand with just seven scores posted so far. There are other plays with more games in hand which makes things difficult to predict at this stage what may happen, but my guess is this is going down to the final week.

Week 11 once again saw a solid score of 39 points from a very consistent Kevin Barber. That gave him a four shot lead in the league in front of closest challenger Chris Exton who sits one point ahead of Steve Moores in third place. Last weekend gave us yet another winner, that's 10 winners in 11 weeks.

Mr Stuart Mulvaney managed to nose out in-form Paul Murray by a card play off on 42 points. They finished one shot clear of Jon white who managed a very respectable 41 points.

It's Kevin Barber who holds the Yellow Jersey for week 12 though for a second week running and with only 7 weeks remaining, will he have it for week 13? Only Sunday will we find out. Game on..