On a glorious autumn day with minimal wind we played our second Senior Teams Challenge match of the season, also away from home, at Ashgrove Golf Club yesterday. After all the heavy Brisbane rain we have had a bridge wash-out meant the back nine had to be rerouted somewhat and the 10th (which we played as our 17th on the day) teeing off from a much shorter position on the other side of the creek. We played with preferred lies and a number of bunkers out of play. Considering all this, the course was in good condition and the greens, although a bit slow, were reasonably true.

Local course knowledge plays a big part for successfully negotiating Ashgrove with some sharp doglegs and tight driving holes, as well as its many slopes – a mountain goat would be right at home. With this in mind, coming away with a 3.5/2.5 win is a fantastic result.

Here are the individual match stories:

1. Number one is always a very important and difficult task away from home.  Peter Hargreaves performed admirably against Peter Hill to finish up all square after 18 holes. The highlight of the match, both pairings in fact, was duel holes-in-one almost, on the 17th (14th hole played) by both Ashgrove players.  This is an interesting hole off the blue tips. One has to traverse a very steep walk, way up in the nose bleeds, to get to the tee. It is then rather challenging for an away player to work out what club to hit from such a great height. Once again, well done to Asha’s Dad

2. In the number twos, Peter Martin was having a great battle with John Shaw. After nine holes Marto was one over the card but one down.  Then, on the 10th (13th hole played), both players teed off into positions where it should have been a fairly easy task to locate their balls. It appeared that two young fellas playing an adjacent hole may have picked up their balls.  In fact, Peter Hargreaves playing in the group in front yelled out at the boys to put the balls down.  When Marto and Shaw got to their drives, the Ashgrove player’s ball was able to be found but Marto’s ball was no more!  Marto lost that hole and the wind went right out of his sails and he never recovered to lose 4/3.  A cruel blow

3. Darryl Stuckey had a day out against Russell Albion, going at least five up on the front nine and cruising to a 4/2 win. A great win to a really good match player

4. Richard Garnham came up against an opponent in opposing captain Don Campbell who was in total control of his game.  If he wasn’t knocking fairway shots in close for birdies, he was chipping and putting the lights out from everywhere for pars. This resulted in a 5/4 win to Ashgrove. Next time eh Richard…

5. In the first of the 4BBB matches Richard Peacock (a past pennant player at Ashgrove) and Graeme Buckland were pitted against Trevor Grant and Mark Wilcox. Richard started like a house on fire and then Graeme popped up later on when required to keep the heat on the opponents for a strong 6/4 win to BGC

6. The final match played right to the death, at least one hour after the other matches were completed. Geoff Crozier and Rob Brown were up against ‘Mad’ Rob Mathieson and Shane Corbett.  The BGC pair lost both their balls off the first tee and subsequently lost the hole which wasn’t a great start. But after that Croz came alive and played some excellent and intimidating golf (at 6ft 5in he hits a massive ball) including a great birdie on the par five 4th to take BGC to three up. After that the BGC boys fell asleep to let the Ashgrove pair back in on holes they shouldn’t have let slip and standing on the 18th tee BGC was one up.  Brownie luckily knocked his gap wedge to within three feet of the 18th hole for an easy tap-in birdie amid rapturous applause from his team mates at the bar overlooking the green. This gave us a two up win and sealed the day.

Next week on Thursday 8th May we are playing at home against Wantima with a noon start and it would be great to keep our winning form going. We’d love to have some supporters join us during the afternoon to see some entertaining match play golf.

Rob Brown