Hawkstone Park Golf Club – Clarke Cup

First of all a huge shout out to Keith Dreaves who made the 19 hour trip from Scotland to make up the numbers, top man. Only downside is he took 2/2 points for team Europe, bastard.

 

Day 1 was a lively event, el Franco was on fire and even though Dave Hadden had 100% stat for wrong fairways in play, he managed to up and down the 18th after telling Si to piss off to complete a Davies & Frank “3up with 3 to play” turn around to half the match. We were gutted.

 

Computer game Nelson was up to his usual Ryder Cup tricks and Bower decided to throw in a 42 point stableford performance on day 1 when stableford points didn’t count. After day 1, team Europe were up 2.5 vs 1.5; an incredible feat for team US given 14 people turned up wearing blue on day 1. 

 

The final day was the singles, shout out to Evan who scored 20 on the back 9 and turned around a 4 down deficit to Josh, Andy Davies who edged out Bower on the final putt of the last hole, super Les for thinking day 2 was the day 1 format until hole 12, the 20 man punch up in the restaurant on night 1, the weather for being ok after a dreadful forecast, and sorry dad, but a 7 hole blob finish for big Col Davies. He’ll be back! 

 

To finish, my favourite moment of the trip was on the back 9 seeing the beautiful rocks in the distance 40 metres high, aka the Hawkstone follies, I noticed some movement at the top of the follies and a person coming into view, my first thought genuinely was “is that Dave Hadden” after his tee shot on the tenth.

 

Well done to team Europe who won 7.5 – 4.5

 

Splendid trip and thanks to Clarkey for organising.