Our first visit to Pidley for many a year saw a very good turnout of 14 including a Fritz Follies debut for Graeme Phipps, a continued return from knee surgery for Sir Les and, after a 15 year break, a welcome back to Phil Taylor who was a regular Follies member in London and in Peterborough till 1999.

Lakeside Lodge seems to be a thriving club with a packed car park and a busy bar/restaurant on a Friday lunchtime in April. Food and drink were taken in advance of heading out into a lovely warm spring day.

On the 1st tee, Les put his tee shot out of bounds to the right. Colin Savage gleefully commented, “that one’s in St Ives”. Colin duly teed off a minute later and did exactly the same – you can guess what Les said!

An early claim for Bunker Flunker was made by Colin Savage with 3 attempts to get out of one.

Results:
Nearest The Pin – A good effort by David West stood until the last group when Geoff Delaney got inside and, to his credit, birdied it.

3rd – new boy Graeme Phipps collected a prize on his first outing with 33 points

2nd – our reigning Champion Golfer Colin Humphries finished with 35 points

1st – Robin Watts built on his earlier good round at Sleaford with a winning 39 points. Robin also leads the overall 2015 standings.

The first outing of the season certainly cleared the cobwebs, with a strong wind blowing across the course.

Les was back in action with 1 bionic knee, and to prove that he was ok after his first 18 holes of golf, we all sat and watched him limp across the clubhouse, to the kitchen to tell them that we were ready for our meal.

The bacon and coffee on arrival was very welcome as was the beef casserole afterwards with the exception of Trevor who had ham egg and chips as he doesn’t like onions.

Colin, a popular name within the Follies has ceased to be popular with Les, as 2 out of 3 dropped out, but it was a welcome back to Andrew Bramwell as he played for the first time in 2 years.

The last group of the day provided the waiting masses in the clubhouse with plenty of entertainment as they played the 18th. Gabe, Brian, Robin and David strode up the fairway crossing over each other checking the 3 balls in sight. Dave then looked a disconsolant figure as walked back down the fairway to find his ball. Finally they made it to the green where they made Robin put out from about 9 inches. We all thought he was on for a massive score but he came third.

Well done to Roy Fletcher who won with 41 points putting down an early marker for the Trophy, and to Dave West who won a bottle of port for nearest the pin, It was suggested that this would have washed the meal down nicely, but Dave had other ideas.

Report by Martin Zebedee.

As well as Champion Golfer, President’s Cup and the Annual Supper Texas Scramble, we have another competition this year – The Shirtie!

Your Shirtie committee invites you to submit pictures of members wearing the new distinctive Fritz Follies Golf Society shirt in unusual places around the world on their travels e.g. at Old Trafford, outside the Vatican, at the top of the Empire State Building, on the Great Wall of China etc..

Please send all photos to me at jonkelly411@hotmail.com

No photoshopping or other jiggery-pokery will be entertained!

An appropriate trophy will be awarded at the Supper.

Les reports:

The You’re Hired team who could be my scramble partners next year, 68.20 Keal/Humphries/Liscoe/Wakefield

The team that with better management of the drives should have won 68.90 Watts/Zebedee/Bates/Savage

The deadwood, you’re definitely not hired 3rd– 70.30 Delany/Fletcher/Kelly

A dozen lucky Follies had the pleasure of a beautiful mid-October afternoon’s round of the rarely visited Milton Golf Course.   With this being the last event counting towards this year’s awards and to keep the suspense going till the end, results will not be published until after the Annual Supper and Prize Giving.

However, we were allowed to see Brian and Colin H’s holiday home but we were not invited in.

So, on to our Final Events of the year on Friday 7th November – teeing off with breakfast at the Stibbington Diner, continuing with golf at Elton Furze and ending with the Fritz Follies Golf Society Annual Supper and Prize Giving 2014 in the Cuckoo, Alwalton.

Hope to see you there!

No-one has ever said that playing at The Bedfordshire was easy. Indeed many have said it is one of the most difficult courses we play. Regardless, Colin Humphries absolutely smashed it recording a highest ever Fritz Follies total of 51 points!  The biggest threat came from Colin Savage’s attempt to steer Colin H’s and his own trolley at the same time which nearly resulted in both going into the water.  It appears that sharing the same christian name was a good thing that day as Mr Keal won the nearest the pin when his ball came to rest about 2 feet 3 inches from the pin and Mr Savage scored a normally good enough to win 40 points. Honourable mentions in despatches for Roy and Phil who finished way back on 39 points each!

Colin H attributed much of his success to recent lessons with Gary Casey at Thorpe Wood…..maybe we should all head that way.

Sadly for those concerned, if not for everybody else, the Handicap secretary has cut all those that had net scores under 70 i.e. Colin/Colin/Phil 🙂

Following an excellent bacon sandwich and resplendent in our new shirts, thanks for organising those Les, 14 hardy Follies posed for a team photo and then set off on a very windy Old Nene course. For some, this was their first experience of a nine hole course, but, with a little orienteering skill, we found our way round ok.

We were accompanied throughout the round by the Boom Boom Boom of what could have been a ghostly Roman Galley drummer from years gone by. Whatever it was, it was loud, consistent and went on all day.

Signage was lacking in a number of places and after the 5^th, Omar’s group went left, then right and finally left again searching for the 6^th. The 6^th tee was different in that we’d never seen a ‘Boats have priority’ sign on a tee before. And sure enough a boat did pass between tee and fairway as Jon shaped to tee-up.

From the elevated 6^th tee, the flag looked a long way off – Colin S estimated it as about 3 miles and then went on to par it!

A very disappointing incident was reported on the 11^th when the group following Les’ group arrived at the green to find the flag horizontal/laying by the hole/not upright/not stuck in the hole.

On the 14^th, Martin drove off, his ball hit a tree and rebounded about 20 feet behind the tee.

In the second group, halfway down a fairway, Geoff Delaney discovered his putter cover was missing. He ran to the tee, couldn’t find it, ran back to find it lying the other side of his bag.

John Wakefield had a decent front nine but then the wheels came off. He lost 6 balls, played Robin’s ball instead of his own and when Robin said after John’s putt, “Take it away” John thought he had given him the putt but Robin meant the flag!

On the 15^th Colin S decided he needed all his clubs to hand and duly dragged his trolley up a very steep bank:

Towards the end of the round, the weather closed in and as the thunder started, the last two groups reformed as some pushed on and some sheltered. However, we all finished safely if damp.

The results for the day were:

Nearest the hole on the 12^th, John Wakefield

3^rd on countback-Roy Fletcher

2^nd –Colin Humphries, both with 34 points

1^st Colin Savage with 39 points.

Geoff then, on behalf of us all, wished Les well for his forthcoming ops and we all look forward to seeing him back on the fairways next summer complete with bionic knees. The next Follies outing is Friday September 19^th at The Bedfordshire.

Size Description – Chest (to fit) S – 36″, M – 38/40″, L – 42″, XL – 44/46″, 2XL – 48″

Special Fritz Follies price of £17

All orders to les@akbook-keeping.co.uk