Does anyone know how to do a rain dance? Our green keepers are doing a sterling job keeping our greens and tee blocks watered but our fairways rely on natural watering so are now drying off quite markedly. Great for getting extra ball roll, and less mowing for our green keepers, but a pity that our course is losing its emerald splendour so soon into summer.

This Weekend’s Events

Tomorrow our Women’s Saturday Club are having their Closing Day and playing Russian Roulette Stableford. Our men monthly medal winners are competing for the title Top Dog with 3 foursomes teeing off sequentially at 10am. Club Captain Carl is also organising some Interclub Practice, with the first round of Interclub scheduled for 27th January. The draw for these is as follows:

Interclub Practice:

9.06 – Dave Thorburn (also in Top Dog)/Mike Wood/Alex Lim

9.13 – Graham Dray/Carl Beentjes/Ben Paradza

9.20 – Gerald Ross/Geoff Parr/ Dean Milne

with 9.27 and 9.34 tee slots reserved for other interclub groupings still being formed

Top Dog:

10.02 – Trevor Brown/Jan Sharp/Wayne Cook

10.09 – Erich Bucher/Paul Hawkes/Geoff Lee/Keith Atkinson

10.16 – Sean Lister/Jono Wake/Dave Ainsworth/Jim Waters

Please note that all the Top Dog finalists will be playing off the white tees, irrespective of which tee they won their medal on.

Other Upcoming Events

Next Saturday 16th December is the Club’s Closing Day, which is a bit of a misnomer given we don’t actually close, but it signals the end of the various 2017 Club events, and concludes with prize giving and awarding the trophies that have been competed for throughout the year. It will begin with a champagne cocktail breakfast at 8am, followed by a shotgun start fun tournament at 9am, with prize giving back in the clubhouse after play. The entry fee is only $10, which includes the cost of the breakfast. Traditionally we have an ambrose tournament with some quirky things having to be done on various holes, but this year we thought we would do something slightly different and play “Irish Foursomes”. We will still play in teams of 4, and on holes 1-6 the team will score the best individual stableford score of the team members, on holes 7-12 they will score the best 2 stableford scores, and on holes 13-18 the best 3 stableford scores. We will have prizes for the best team scores plus best individual stableford scores. Teams will be drawn at random, although we will allow members to form their own teams, but to do so, they will have to pay an extra $5 per person entry fee, which will be put towards the 2018 capital fund. An entry form is on the downstairs notice board otherwise ring/email the club. Late entries will be accepted, but we would prefer to know in advance whether you intend playing so that we can determine catering requirements and to give us time to randomly draw the teams.

Although Closing Day wraps up the year’s organised club events, our traditional summer events have already kicked off. Firstly, the men’s Summer Eclectic is now open, whereby members track the best score they have recorded for each hole during weekend rounds played off the blue or white tees in December, January and February. There is a form on the downstairs notice board to enable you to do this, so start recording those birdies or other good scores, and you may be surprised as to how good a player you could be by totaling your best scores for each hole over the summer period.

Also now open is the Miners Arms Bowl pairs event. This requires pairs to play a 4BBB stableford round in each of December, January and February with the winning team being the one with the lowest aggregate total of the 3 rounds. Arrange your own partners, and note that rounds need to be nominated before commencement and must be played in the company of at least one other member.

Annual General Meeting

Last Saturday was our Annual General Meeting – thanks to everyone who came along – a lot of work goes into producing the Annual Report and the Financial Statements so it is good to see members taking an interest in the running of the club and in its performance. The 2017 Committee was re-elected along with 4 new Committee members, bringing the size up to 10. The 2018 Committee is

President: Jonathan Wake

Treasurer: Wayne Cook

Men’s Club Captain: Carl Beentjes

Women’s Club Captain: Fiona Kearns

Committee Members: Erich Bucher, Jay Maaka, Gerald Ross, Peter Howman, Andrew Hyett, Dick Borgdorff

Draft minutes of the meeting are attached.

Recent Results

A disc draw stableford tournament was held after the AGM with the winner being Rose Rigarlsford, on 39 stableford points, 1 ahead of Gail Kirkland and Graeme Crocker, both on 38.

On Sunday the Shootout finalists slugged it out for the opportunity of becoming the club’s Top Gun for 2017. Of the 15 men who teed off on the 5th hole at about 8.30am, it was “Timmy The Kid” Allison and Nobby "Garrett" who shot it out on the final hole. Shooting down the OK Corral of the 18th fairway Timmy got his ball onto the edge of the green with his second shot, albeit facing a long putt, while Nobby ended up slightly short and left of the green, under the trees and with a difficult chip over the gully. Despite executing an excellent chip, he missed his putt enabling Tim to earn his spurs and the honour of being KGC’s men’s Top Gun for 2017. Well done Tim.

Gunslingers on the 7th tee, with Timmy the Kid keeping a close eye on the back of Nobby Garrett:

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Desperately Seeking Srixon - How many members, under the watchful eye of time keeping Club Captain Carl, does it take to find to Irishman's golf ball - not enough unfortunately for Pete McMillen on the 6th hole:

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A smaller field of women teed off later in the morning in their shootout, with Caroline Appleton prevailing over on the 18th hole.

Christmas Trees

Our elves will be cutting Christmas Trees on Monday and will have them available for sale and pick up under the balcony of the clubhouse later in the day. Only $20 for a genuine Christmas tree, grown on the golf course.

Harcourts Twilight Thursday 7th December

A very warm night for Twilight golf this week as the heat wave continues. A good turnout of 21 golfers competing for the prize money and 23 for the bbq dinner as we were joined by Anita Corlett, William Yip, and Silver Wilford from the Harcourts Yip team. The winner on 25 points was Peter Nichols ($20), his best round ever. Geoff Lee was second on 23 points ($15); Doug Calhoun third on 22 points ($10) and joint fourth were Phil Robinson, Gail Kirkland and Jo Hurst on 20 points ($5). We had two first time players this week - Shelley Hall, one of our regular Saturday lady players, and her son Andrew, who both received our $5 welcome voucher. We also welcomed Jeff Mason back for the first time this year. Thanks to Sara for preparing dinner, and Don and Karen who helped with the bbq.

Please remember the $5 welcome voucher for any first time player - all members, friends and visitors are very welcome to join the fun of Twilight golf. Tee off is between 4.30pm and 5.30pm, followed by a bbq dinner and prize giving. Wayne and Tim

Wednesday Club

KGC Wednesday Club Results for December 6th & Annual Prize Giving 2017:

A very warm and sunny day cooled by a very light Southerly paved the way for some very good scores for the first round of next year’s Wednesday Club competitions (2018) contested by 40 enthusiastic players.

The winner of the Stableford competition was Fergus Mclean with a fine 44 points followed by runner up Patrick Cordue 41 and Ian Bates in third place with 40.

Golf balls were won by those with 37 points or more and naturally there’s always someone for whom nothing seemed to go quite right and this day Gunter Karau carried off the prize for sheer persistence.

Only one “Two” was scored and this by Jerry Barber on the 6th while the Nearest the Pin on the 4th was claimed by Graham Presland who sadly missed his Putt and forfeited the usual $1 fine in the clubhouse.

The weekly Raffle was won by No 44 Athol Swann, one of 8 Nine Holers out there enjoying the Sun! Second place No 31 held by Gunter Karau and Third No 30 Graham Presland.

The 10.30 AM start had everyone back in the clubhouse a little earlier to take advantage of the End of Year Wednesday Club afternoon tea “Shout” and the awards/prizes for competitions overall during 2017 which were announced by Chris Pearce and presented by Club Captain Carl Beentjes as follows for the Wednesday Club (photos of winners who were present will be uploaded onto our Facebook page):

Stableford Trophy: Winner: Luke Underwood) R/U: Victor Diem.

Par Trophy: Winner: Gerd Warnke R/U: Patrick Cordue.

Vin Mitchener Cup (> 65’s Stableford): Winner: Ian Bates R/U: Keith Gaskin

Motor Distributors Cup (> 65’s Par): Winner: David Ainsworth R/U: David Burton.

Stuart Cathie Cup (Stableford & Par): Winner: Derek Fitzgibbon R/U: Don McCrone.

Mel Cade Cup (Stableford & Par >65’s): Winner: Martin Leung R/U: Satish Chandra.

There were five Karori Golf Club Trophies played for during 2017 as part of the Wednesday Club normal competitions (prizes given on the day of the Competition but not the trophies):

The Bogey Cup: Winner: Satish Chandra R/U: Graeme Crocker.

The Nes Beard Trophy: Winner: Mike Cox R/U: Guy Walmsley

Makara Trophy: Winner: Ian Bates & Chris Pearce R/U: Peter Wilcox & Ian Livingstone.

The India Cup: Winner: Jan Sharp R/U: Martin Leung

The Oteranga Trophy: Winner: Jan Sharp & Keith Gaskin R/U: Tim Allison & Chris Pearce.

Chris Pearce announced he was standing down after 6 years as organiser for the Wednesday Club and was warmly applauded for his enthusiastic work and attention to detail. He thanked all those, including Greens Staff, Sara, Tiffany and Mark who helped to make Wednesday Club such an enjoyable golfing experience....just as Nes Beard who began it all back in the 1970’s envisaged it should be, followed by Vin Mitchener & Joe Anderson.

He also referred to the mysterious Green receptacle used to collect the Nearest the Pin fines for missing the putt, becoming too full so there will be an opportunity to win a prize by guessing how much is in there upon opening between now and Wednesday 20 December - see next week 13 December.

Victor Diem made a presentation to Chris on behalf of the members in appreciation of his promotion of camaraderie throughout the Wednesday Club and his great organisational skills proving so effective. An altogether super day at our own Golf Club and we look forward to many more to come. Cheers, DS

Sponsor Speak

The fifteenth hole is longer off the whites than the par 5 14th, but being downhill, is only a par 4. You need to tee off long and straight to avoid the irrigation lake on the right or the gully on the left. It is sponsored by Wasabi Air, specialists in heat pumps and air conditioning systems, which no doubt some of us could be wishing we had given the recent temperatures. Click here to connect to their website:

Wasabi Air

The photos below shows the location of the irrigation lake in relation to the original farmland:

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Happy golfing, play safely,

Your KGC Committee