fritzfolliesgolfsociety

John and Shirtie at the Glen Grant distillery and RSPB Loch Garten

Our visit to Burghley Park was, thanks to the careful planning of Les, a day for slapping on the sun screen. Well done Les.

A very formal beginning to proceedings, a starter! We were each presented with a little bag of goodies and given a pep talk about the rules of the course, some of which we had forgotten, before reaching the first green. The course was in very good condition with most of the greens being quite soft. There were many a chip and run that failed to run. One other noticeable feature that was missing was the long rough to the right of the 7th tee. Many an hour was spent in there during previous visits, vainly searching for lost balls.

There is a new candidate to win the Bunker Flunker trophy. Do you actually “win”, Bunker Flunker or are you awarded a trophy you don’t really want. Anyway, Colin Savage can now breathe a sigh of relief, John Wakefield became front runner for the trophy taking a magnificent 7 shots to get out.

Results

Following his first place at Sleaford, Roy Fletcher was again in the prizes winning nearest the pin. He said he was only 18 inches away. Just imagine Roy if it had been 18 inches closer, you wouldn’t have had much of the whisky left to take home.

As for the main competition – it was very close at the top, only two points separating the top four scores, so there had to be an unlucky golfer. Without Les, Colin S did the necessary on the cards and Robin did a sterling job on the presentation

Imagine getting 18 points on the front 9 and losing out to Jon Kelly who got 18 points on the back and picked up third place with 33 points.

Colin Humphries was only 1 point ahead on 34 points in second place.

It was Richard Cheng on 35 points who came out on top. Well done Richard.

Reporter’s tip – before you hit that little white thing at your feet, make sure it’s your little white thing – sorry Colin.

Next Outing – June 26th at Elton Furze.

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 🙂