From Tony Durkin
ADAM WINS AWARD: Headland’s Head Pro, Adam Norlander, has won the prestigious Australian PGA Club Professional of the Year Award for 2018.The award was presented at the Greg Norman Medal dinner at Royal Pines on Tuesday night and Adam, who was voted Queensland PGA Club Professional of the Year in March, beat each of the other state winners to the gong. One of the major contributing factors in Adam being awarded the recognition was the member-satisfaction rating compiled from a survey conducted by research company Golf Business Advisory Services. When the company polled Headland Golf Club members last year, the highest score recorded for member satisfaction in any area associated with the club was 9.1 (from a possible 10) for Golf Operations. And not only was it the highest score returned at Headland, but also the highest for this area of operations in all survey work conducted by GBAS in the 12-year history of the company. While he is proud of the recognition received from his industry peers, Adam is equally enamoured by the acknowledgement from the Headland board of directors, who nominated him, and the Headland members who voted so enthusiastically in the 2017 survey. He described Headland as ‘a happy club’ and said his staff did its very best to help keep it that way. Adam also said the award was as much for the Golf Operations staff of Matt Douglas, Nate Smyth and Dominique Paice, as it was for him.
RHONDA ACED: Rhonda Biggs was about to head back to the eighth tee to reload last Thursday when her fourball partner, Leeanne Ptak, decided to peer into the hole. And there, staring back at her, was Rhonda’s ‘lost’ pink ball. Rhonda was the last of the quartet to tee off and her playing partners weren’t actually watching, and although she knew she had struck it well, she thought the shot may have been a little long. But with the pink ball against an overcast sky, she wasn’t quite sure where it finished. So, when none of the quartet could see it on or near the green, or in the bunker, Rhonda was resigned to the fact it was a lost ball. Rhonda is a graduate of the 2015 SWING program, and needless to say it is her first hole in one, and despite the fact the only memory of the ace is the scorecard, a bottle of bubbly was produced when the round finished. And it soon became a double celebration – playing partners Kym Mason and Sharleen McMullen won the Fourball Best Ball Stableford event with 46 points.
Celebrating with Rhonda (second from right) are Kym Mason, Leanne Ptak And Sharleen McMullen
PLUS-SIZE GOLF: Ask the regular golfer what is their least-liked event, and most will say a single par competition. The consensus is that an ‘average’ golfer – 16 handicap for men, 28 for ladies – is not sufficiently rewarded for birdies and eagles in an event where par is the ultimate goal. But during the past week at Headland that opinion may have changed with some outstanding scores returned in three separate events. On Tuesday both the men and ladies played a par event, with Madeline Stoopin scoring plus seven to post the best score of the day, one shot better than men’s winner Bob Hunter (plus six). Then on Thursday the men played another par event and Trevor Simpson topped the score for the week with an outstanding round of plus eight. Overall, 47 players in the three events played better than their handicap.
SUPER GOLF: Although Headland’s annual Super Golf tournament is still a little under three weeks away, already 40 of the maximum 60 team spots for the two-day event have been filled. So popular has Super Golf become that this year the event has been extended to two days, with two completely different 10-hole ‘cross-country’ courses being played on Saturday (December 15) and Sunday (December 16) programs. Three time slots are available each day – 7am, 10.30am and 2pm – with a capacity of 88 players for each tee time. Online nominations opened last weekend, but those wanting to play just on the Saturday or the Sunday, will need to wait until a week before the event to book a spot via the timesheet. And because of the early rush, Club Captain James Kidd has urged members keen to play to organise a team for the four-person Ambrose event ASAP to avoid disappointment. Trophies will be awarded for competitions on both days, but overall weekend team winners will also be recognised. Major sponsors are Bidfood and CUB while EKO Financial, Walsh Professional Engineers, Outdoor Elegance, GV Sensors, Image Business Furniture, BCP Strata, Grant Martyn Constructions, Better Business Finance, Headland Pro Shop and Directline Timbers have taken hole sponsorships for both days.
HOLE-IN-HOPE: Liz Dunford has been playing golf only since she joined Headland nine years ago, but is desperately keen to beat her husband Tony to score a hole-in-one. And, despite a hiccup on Thursday, the self-confessed golf tragic has almost achieved her goal three times in the past couple of weeks. Three weeks ago, her tee shot on the 14th hit the pin and ricocheted two metres form the hole, while on Saturday, at the eighth hole, her ‘straight -as-a-die’ five-rescue shot finished 51 centimetres below the hole. But another close shave – and an NTP at 105cms – averted her on Thursday when she was beaten by hole-in-one rookie Rhonda Biggs. And while husband Tony – who is also searching for his inaugural ace – may not have won any pin shots on Saturday, he did finish second in A Grade with 40 points, despite a frustrating three-putt bogey from one metre on the 17th – the only major blemish on his impressive card.
COL’S CARRIAGE: Col Thomas, an ex-builder who has been retired four years, has turned some heads at Headland in the past two weeks ‘parading’ a new form of golf course transport. However, he stresses it is not a sign of laziness, but simply a way to protect his ‘dicky’ knees and is only used when traveling downhill or on the flat ground. Pulled by his electric buggy, Col has designed and built what looks like a skateboard on two golf buggy-sized wheels. The ‘golf board’ on which he stands is made from marine ply timber, is extremely light but very strong, easily taking his 90kg weight. However, the power source from his golf buggy is not sufficient to pull him up hills, of which there are many at Headland. Although in the embryonic stages of development, 40-year member Col is confident his ‘golf board’ can be fine-tuned and will become his permanent mode of golfing transport.
Col Thomas navigates Headland in his ‘golf board’.
WHOOPS: An uncharacteristic poor drive and the resultant nasty triple bogey on the ninth hole on Saturday has cost Bob Trevor the landmark effort of shooting less than his age for the fifth time. Playing in the Single Stableford event, Bob returned a three-over par 75 and had 42 points to win the A Grade competition by two points. Four times since 2015, with a round back then of 69 when he was 71 years of age, Bob has scored lower than his age, and back in April this year had 73 – with three birdies and four bogeys – to shoot his first age equaliser. Bob, who turned 74 on November 12, had three birdies and three bogeys on Saturday’s card, but his round was scarred by that disastrous seven on the ninth.
KEN AGAIN: On the subject of shooting a score less than their age, Ken Anderson has done it again – for the 14th time. On Wednesday, playing in the Fourball Best Ball Aggregate event, the 77-year-old had 74 to score less than his age for a phenomenal 14th time. His four birdies matched his four bogeys, with the two-over round blotted by an uncharacteristic double bogey on the 16th. Ken, who played off six on Wednesday, first beat his age in a five-under par round of 67 in 2011 when he was 70 and his most recent before Wednesday – his lucky 13th – was a three-over par 75 in September.
PROUD KIWI: New Zealand may have finished 18th in the World Cup of Golf, their Rugby League team beaten 2-1 in the recent Test series against England and the brilliant All Blacks had their colours lowered by Ireland, but proud local ex-Kiwi Neven Daniel kept their flag flying at Headland on Sunday. Playing off eight in the Medley Single Stableford event, the IT whiz signed for a one-over par 73 (36/37) for 43 points in his best-ever round since joining the club seven years ago, and a clear win in the competition. His two birdies were thwarted by three bogeys, but he added a sweetener by winning nearest-the-pin on the 14th. So hot was the scoring from the small field on Sunday that Wayne West, with a par round and 39 points, could only figure in the rundown.
WEEKLY WINNERS:
Tuesday, Single Par, Ladies (49 players) – Madeline Stoopin (plus 7), Margot Hatton (plus 3), Jackie Walkington (plus 3); Men (75 players) – Bob Hunter (plus 6), Jock McLaughlin (plus 5), Tony Kelleher (plus 4).
Wednesday, Men, Fourball Aggregate Stableford (199 players) – Gerry Brown and Brian Kesby (83 points), Chris Pace and Paul Henricks (83), John Logan and Peter Dawson (79), Peter Francis and John Cleary (79), James Kidd and Mark Fisher (77).
Thursday, Ladies, Fourball Best Ball Stableford (96 players) – Kym Mason and Sharleen McMullen (46 points), Donna Rose and Helen Martyn (46), Rosalie Brandt and Sue Jones (45), Monica Knowles and Kathy Atkins (45), Katina Watts and Ellen Bloxsome (45).
Men, Single Par (77 players) – Trevor Simpson (plus 8), Earl Hicks (plus 6), Alexander Jamieson (plus 6).
Saturday, Single Stableford, Ladies (30 players), Colleen Berger (41 points), Glenda Bates (40), Helen Fraser (36); Men (212 players) – A Grade, Bob Trevor (42 points), Tony Dunford (40), James Kidd (37); B Grade, Mike Radmall (41), Rod Besley (40), Tony Briffa (40); C Grade, Lachlan Moffat (39), Mark Fisher (38), Tom Burnett (38).
Sunday, Medley Single Stableford (30 players) – Neven Daniel (43 points), Kirsten Kaergaard (40).
