PSC Golf from the Café Kronborg
Monday, January 9, Plutaluang W&N – Stableford
After two late cancellations we were down to 37 starters for our monthly trip to the popular but tough Plutaluang layout. We welcomed back Dick Braimbridge from his month in Queensland and Mike Herridge from the U.K. It was also good to have Dick Warberg from Tropical Berts playing with us and he was made very welcome. On a sad note we said farewell to my good mate Frankie Sharratt who is returning to Derby, U.K. later in the week along with Volker Buley who returns to Germany.
We departed the Kronny right on time at 0815 hrs and arrived at the course 45 minutes later. I can’t remember ever seeing this course so busy as there were people everywhere, so we knew that it would be a long day and we were allocated the West & North nines. Our first group got away 15 minutes ahead of schedule at 0945 hrs but being a three-ball the going was slow behind a mixed foursome and we were waiting on just about every shot.
Frankie Sharratt, The Admiral & Graham Buckingham.
The weather was great with a stiff breeze which made the West nine even more difficult at times but the nines that we played were in terrific condition, especially the greens which were the best I have ever seen them in 23 years of playing the course. After several enforced drink stops we finally completed our round in four hours & thirty five minutes, which was not too bad under the circumstances. This would have to be one of the best value for money courses around.
There were 2 flights with A Flight for handicaps 0 to 19 and B Flight for 20 and over. There were rewards for nearest the pin on all four par threes and longest first putts on the ninth & eighteenth greens.
The going was tough for most on the day as not one golfer managed to play better than their handicap and there were many more scores in the twenties than in the thirties.
Frankie Sharratt mentioned to me last week that he had been coming to Pattaya to play golf for sixteen years and he had never won a competition but this day was his “day in the sun”. On a count back with 36 points (18 on the back nine) he won the A Flight from Rob Brown (17 point back nine) and San Miguel Stu Rifkin finished third on 33 points. In a count back for fourth & fifth on 31 points Ken Bernek (17 point back nine) edged out Mike Gosden (15 point back nine) with yours truly scraping into sixth spot on 30 points.
The B Flight was easily won by Graham Buckingham on 36 points, 5 points clear of Urs Zwicky in second place. A two-way count back was necessary to decide third & fourth places with Bjarne Kjaer (17 point back nine) just beating Dick Warberg (14 point back nine), both having 30 points. In a three way count back for fifth & sixth spots Jerry Dobbs (18 point back nine) beat Jan Lovgreen (14 point back nine). Both golfers had 29 points along with Kevin Dinan (12 point back nine) who just missed out on a podium finish.
A Flight (0-19)
1st Frank Sharratt (13) 36pts
2nd Rob Brown (10) 36pts
3rd Stu Rifkin (14) 33pts
4th Ken Bernek (15) 31pts
5th Mike Gosden (11) 31pts
6th Peter Blackburn (13) 30pts
B Flight (20+)
1st Graham Buckingham (22) 36pts
2nd Urs Zwicky (23) 31pts
3rd Bjarne Kjaer (21) 30pts
4th Dick Warberg (20) 30pts
5th Jerry Dobbs (23) 29pts
6th Jan Lovgreen (24) 29pts
Near Pins: W3 – Don Richardson, W8 – Mike Allidi, N3 – Frank Sharratt, N6 – Takeshi Hakozaki
Long Putts: W9 – Peter Blackburn, N9 – Michael Catillon
The Compass Cap (worst score on the day) was won by Volker Buley and Deefa the Dog had a walk around with his master, Hunter and collected many donations to charity from our generous Café Kronborg group.
