The seventeenth week of the Winter Order of Merit saw yet another first time winner. Ray Hughes returned a solid 39 points to win, just edging out Club Captain Trevor Smith with an equally impressive 39 points off scratch. Ray was docked two shots off his handicap and will now play off ten, Trevor also loses a shot and will play off plus one in his next game. Andrew Queen finished third on 38 points, he pushed Terry Smith into fourth place on count back. Andrew will play off eight in the next round after losing point five.

Paul Jenkinson produced another solid round and came in with 37 points, this takes him to the top of the Order of Merit leaderboard for the first time with 186 points, deposing overnight leader Ian Copley into second place some nine points behind. George Grant moves up to third with 161 points, just four ahead of Tony Mould in fourth who slipped back as he didn’t play this week. The injured Adam Clegg falls another place to fifth, he will be out for several more weeks yet and seems destined to drop down the leaderboard.

Trevor Smith jumps up nine places to enter the top ten once again and Ray Hughes moves up eleven places to enter the top twenty. Thirty one players have finished in the weekly top three places and have had a handicap reduction. Neil Harris is the only player in the top twenty five still playing off his original handicap.

Former Seniors’ Captain Peter McDonald Pearce had his first hole in one last week while playing with the seniors on the Valley course. Peter’s ace came on the par three third. Hitting into a strong headwind, Peter decided to go up two clubs and selected a six iron. The flag was on the far left hand side of the green which meant that he had a choice: go over the branches for the flag or go for the middle of the green. Peter went for the direct route and hit the ball cleanly over the trees, the ball landed six inches or so past the hole and spun back into the hole for an ace and five points. He and everybody in the clubhouse celebrated afterwards with a bottle of Jamieson’s Irish whisky to the delight of all who were eager to help him empty it.

The first round of the Gents’ Mail on Sunday competition saw Greetham Valley drawn away at Priors Hall, (Corby) The match was played in cold, wet and windy conditions – far from ideal to play in a competition like this.

Trevor Smith beat Tony Ferns two and one to set Greetham Valley up on the right track; Fraser Denholm continued the trend by beating Ryan Jeffray two up. Steve Anderson managed a half against Graham Thompson in a game that swung backwards and forwards for the whole round. Wayne Terrett lost to Corby Club Captain John Leneghan seven and six.

With everything hanging on the last match Neil Harris fought back twice against Mark Asher from two down to level the match coming in to the final hole. The team just needed a half to secure a win. Neil was unlucky on the flooded last green, he just lipped out on the final par putt. With the overall match all square Neil and Mark had to go head to head on extra holes in a sudden death shoot out. 

With both players finding the hazard off the tee, the game was poised on a knife edge. Another flooded green and a second lip out for Neil saw the match slip away in favour of home player Mark Asher. Both teams battled hard in the cold winds and heavy rain for the tightest of finishes but the home advantage proved decisive in the end for Corby.

After a two week lay off due to heavy snow, the Winter Order of Merit got back underway on Sunday in cold and extremely windy conditions. Thankfully, the snow had gone and it didn’t rain but many of the competitors struggled in the conditions. Wayne Terrett got off to a bad start with bogies and blobs in the first five holes but after a birdie on the sixth he then went on to par the next eight holes to put himself into contention. However, a lapse in concentration caused him to drop shots on 15, 16 and 17. Wayne came home with thirty seven points, enough to place him third. He will lose point five off his handicap and will play off twelve in the next game, he moved up from fourteenth to tenth in the league table. 

Club Secretary Dennis Millington defied the years and the elements to record his best score of the series so far, thirty nine points and second place; Dennis said that there was nothing spectacular about his game, just steady golf right from the start. He loses a shot off his handicap and will now play off fifteen. Dennis moves up from thirty fourth to twenty third in the order of merit.

This weeks winner was Tony Mould playing off six. Tony got off to a bad start with bogies on the first two holes giving him just two points. After parring the next two, he dropped back with bogies on the next three to give him twelve points after seven. A birdie on the eighth resulted in a welcome three points followed by two points on the ninth, just one over his handicap for the front nine was a better return than he thought possible after the first couple of holes. Could it be a good enough springboard to give him a chance to go for the win that he needed to climb into the top three in the table?

The back nine was nothing short of a master class in how to play in the cold and windy conditions. After pars on the tenth and eleventh Tony hit one of the shots of the day on the par three twelfth. The flag was four paces on from the right, another two paces further right was a bunker: Tony hit a superb four iron into the gap only two feet from the hole and sank the putt for a birdie. He parred the next and birdied the tough par three fourteen, this was followed by a magnificent eagle on the par five fifteenth. The sixteenth was right into the teeth of the gale and Tony just missed out on another par but said that in the conditions he wasn’t too unhappy with that. Although the par four seventeenth was also into a tough wind he managed a hard fought par. One hole to go and the nerves were jangling, a cracking tee shot was followed by an uncharacteristic hit into the lake. Tony was determined not to drop more than one shot and chipped his next close and finished off with a bogie five. This gave him a fantastic score of twenty three for the back nine, forty overall and a gross score of seventy four, only two over gross.

Tony had to wait for the next five groups to come in before he was announced as the winner. He became the fourteenth first time winner this year and moved up from thirteenth to third on the table, he was also docked two shots off his handicap and will play off four in his next game. Paul Jenkinson, Steve Anderson and Ian Copley all tied for fourth with thirty six points.

Ian Copley retains first place thanks to a steady thirty six points, he has one hundred and seventy six points so far; the very steady Paul Jenkinson is ten points behind him and Tony Mould is third on one hundred and fifty five. Adam Clegg is in fourth for the moment but he will be out for at least six weeks after breaking his collar bone in a fall while snow skiing. George Grant is less than a point behind Adam in fifth.

Greetham Valley’s Ladies got off to a winning start in their first round of the Mail on Sunday team knockout competition on Sunday against local rivals Rutland County. The Rutland weather conditions were very cold and extremely windy. Gilly Grant got the team off to a good start when she beat Imogen Huxley six and five. Next up was Sue Brand who kept up the pressure by beating Ann Milsom two and one. Anne McCulloch also won her game beating Suzanne Huxley two up. Everybody went to the fourth match to support Pat Jamieson who was playing Michelle Powell. They halved their match to give Greetham the win. Scratch player Sophie Beardsall had a tough game on her hands against Trisha Clark, Sophie was giving Trisha twenty three shots and lost seven and five.  

Well done! The Ladies will find out who their next opponents are in a couple of weeks’ time.

The Air Ambulance receives nothing from Government funding and is only kept flying by public donation. Airshots Golf Society is the brain child of Greetham Valley member Colin Eversden and they have raised £1400 in the last twelve months for the Air Ambulance. After the tragic death of Greetham Valley chef James Adamson in August 2010, Colin decided to find a way to get funds for the service after their valiant efforts to save James. Airshots is made up of thirty two members from four different golf clubs in Lincolnshire and Rutland and they play six or seven venues each year. Funds for the Notts and Lincs Air Ambulance are made up of monies raised from raffles, “good natured” fines and some of the entry fee for each venue. They have a fixed price for each game irrespective of what the venue charges and any excess goes to the fund. They have also been very lucky to find like minded sponsors to support them. Sunlight Laundry, The Pyramid snooker club and the Ps and Qs golf society have all been a great help.

Colin hopes to attract more members for the 2013 season and raise even more funds. Greetham Valley vice Captain Shaun Denholm, who spends a lot of his time raising funds for the Air Ambulance, said that what Colin and the lads have done is fantastic and added that but for people like them, the service wouldn’t be able to operate. Shaun runs the Air Ambulance Lottery in our area, each entry costs only 50 pence per line and offers up to a thousand pounds in prize money each month. He said that a small amount from a lot of people can add up to be a massive help to the service. For details of how you can enter the lottery or join Airshots, contact Fred Aspin at fwapropguard@msn.com

Round 13 of the Winter Order of Merit was very unlucky for some, played in cold and windy conditions, with only three players managing to come in under par. Chris Wheatland jumped from twenty eighth to twelfth position when he took his first win of the series with forty points, he will play off ten next time around. Another solid performance from George Grant saw him take second spot with thirty nine, he jumped from ninth to third and loses a shot and for the next round, he will play off seven. Steve Anderson took third place, he scored thirty seven points and will play off six in the next game.

The top five all struggled in the Rutland weather conditions: Adam Clegg has dropped off the top spot and is now second with a hundred and fifty three points. Ian Copley moves up to first place with a hundred and fifty five, George Grant is third with a hundred and forty eight point four. Dave Copley is a mere point four behind in fourth and Paul Jenkinson is in fifth only point six behind him. Out of the top twenty four only two players have escaped having their handicaps cut.

Organiser Neil Harris said that Chris is the thirteenth first time winner of the series so far and it is extremely congested at the top, anyone from anywhere in the table could win this year.