Round Norfolk Golf Tour summer comp 2019. Round 2 The Masters at Hunstanton

The Masters at Hunstanton

With Easter beng late this year then for the first time in tour history the Masters wasn't the season opener. This meant that several of today's field had already got a round under their belt last week. However the drama started several hours before the round had even started. Several of todays potential lady players had  decided to tune their game up with some warm weather golf in Portugal (where it rained). Unfortunately due to a delayed flight then they didn't get home to 5am with only Chris feeling she was up to playing after so little sleep although as it turned out she wasn't.

Kevin was desperate for the course record of just 32 (held jointly by Robert, Jill and David) to be broken as having a 3 way share mucks up the formatting on the course records page.

Due to the call offs the field had been reduced down to just 6 with conditions looking tough due to a strong and cold wind.

Reigning Masters champion, Robert, got things underway but failed to open his account on the first hole.

As reigning Champion then Robert had the honour of today's opening drive

With most of the outward 9 into the wind Robert was doing well scoring on the rest of the holes but without any 3 pointers. Then on the 9th we turned for home and with wind behind he hit two great shots onto the par 5 9th. His eagle putt just pulled up short for a rare 5 pointer but his 4 for 4 put him onto 15 pts.

Robert taps in for a birdie after just failing to hold his Eagle putt

Despite leaving a shot in his bag and ONLY playing off 28 Vince was making good use of his handicap and was 2 under after 6. However with just a single point in the next 3 holes he also found himself on 15 at halfway.

Vince was chipping well in today's windy conditions (or so he told me)

Unfortunately Chris was suffering from sleep deprivation and with a fuddled brain could only get to 7 pts on the front 9. Unfortunately things didn't improve over the back 9 although a rare par on the 13th at least boosted her back 9 score. She ended with 15 pts which lead to the question of as to if this score had ever been worsened. Well the research has now been done and you can see the answer at the end of the post. Her 7 blobs were not good enough to qualify for the most blobs in a round as 8 is needed to get on that all time leaderboard.

Chris stuck in the fairway bunker on 15.

Talking of blob records Kevin looked like he was easily going to set a new one when he kicked off his round with 4 no pointers. He celebrate his single point on the 5th although John B told him that he was disappointed as he had never seen 18 blobs in a round and would have liked to (thanks). Much to his and his playing partners surprise then out of the blue he birdied the 7th to triple his points score. He ended the 9 with a good par and 10 pts.

Kevin tees off on the 6th to record leading to a point and doubling his total at that point to 2.

Bob wasn't fairing much better after 4 putting the first (for a point) he too blobbed the next three to be only a point better off than Kevin after 4 holes on 1. From this point Kevin (with his dream of completing the career grand slam abandoned for another year) and Bob decided to have their own match as Bob also had 10 pts at the turn.

Bob hits a good teeshot on the second but ended with a blob
after visiting both sand and water but never the green

Bob soon pulled into a 3 point lead but thanks to some more 4 putt action then Kevin pegged him back.

Kevin's teeshot to 16 would have been a contender for nearest the green
as the nearest the pin competition was abandoned

Coming down the last Kevin got an unexpected par while Bob found a deep greenside bunker from which his ball failed to reappear and Kevin had won by a point 25 to 26. Surprisingly no one else seemed to care and were more worried about the RNSG Masters title. John certainly was and backed this up with solid golf and some excellent putting leading at halfway on 16 pts.

John plays an excellent bunker shot leading to two points on the second

So it was a three way battle for the title but Robert was the first to fall away with an opening blob, he failed to make the most of the helping wind and it was only thanks to a par on the last that he managed to get to 27 pts just beating Kevin into the prizes.

Robert also in bunker trouble on 15 but went on to get a par for 2 pts

Vince stormed the opening holes on the back 9 and quickly racked up 14 more points in the first 6 holes before taking his foot of the gas in finishing on 32 pts, but would it be enough.

Vince chipping on to the par 3 14 after laying up.

John was hanging in there but then a slightly thin chipped on 15 mysteriously disappeared into the rough and after a long search (it was 3 minutes as long as you were playing on the edge of a black hole observed from earth) John admitted it was lost and set off muttering to the the next tee.

Unfortunately his shot into the 17th green disappeared in the same fashion as Johns muttering turned into a full scale rant. With the masters title now lost he still needed at least a point on the last to get in the prizes and despite taking two to extract himself from a greenside bunker he sunk a good ten foot put to tie in second place and £1.50 prize.

John tees off while in the lead on the 10th before throwing his lead away

Therefore Vince became theis years masters champion and for the third year running equalled the course record of 32 which has really stuffed up the formatting. Hopefully that total will be finally beaten next year.

For Stats fans here are all rounds of less than a point a hole on the summer tour. And yes Chris's 15 was indeed a new record beating the 16 points scored by Bob at Caldecott Hall back in 2013 it also explains why John H refuses to play at Caister every year.

Chris 15 Hunstanton 2019
Bob   16 Caldecott Hall 2013
Andrew Aickin (who only made one tour appearance) 17 Weston Park 2013
John H 17 Caister 2013
John H 17 Caister 2016
Chris  17 Stoke By Naylands Constable 2018

Next week we head inland to the Bungay which should present a very different challenge.