Rest In Peace Eric
We all knew Eric was unwell and understood it was really a matter of time until he passed away. None of us wanted Eric to suffer or to have no quality of life left. But as our group walked up the 18th fairway yesterday afternoon and saw the flag flying at half mast, there was a shock and sadness about the news and what we thought must have happened.
At 2:30 pm on a Wednesday afternoon Eric decided time was time. No more haggles, no more putts fighting over snakes and no more Blue Jackets or Swinger's Trophies.
It's not my place to write an obituary for Eric as I've really only known him for not that long. If anyone wants to send through stories or thoughts or memories of Eric I'm more than willing to share them.
We did the decent thing and observed a moment's silence remembering Eric then drank to his memory. We shall miss you Eric.
Warren visited Eric on Tuesday this week and took with him The Eric Olsen Trophy. More of that tomorrow night. But Warren tells a lovely story of how Eric was pleased to see him and to see his name on the new trophy. Gaye suggested Eric might want a little drink of water from the cup which he did. But then Eric became tired and fell asleep. It was time for Warren to go and he thought he'd recover the trophy from Eric and bring it back to town from Karitane. As Warren went to take it, Eric was having none of it and his fingers clasped around the cup with the defiant message " you'll be leaving that with me".
Last Tickets For Waitahuna ....
With the Waitahuna golfing calendar coming to a close ahead of our dinner and prize giving this Friday, it was now or never to make that final move into first place, on to the podium, or even just up the field. The results will be announced on Friday and full results published over the weekend.
The day didn't start off well for some .....
Here's where John Marsh's ball ended up playing the first hole. It takes skill to knock a ball there John !!
With Cuts in town, Browny back and Marty in the field it was a good Wednesday crew.
In the sixes there was hint of another " gate" but that didn't happen. There was controversy though. Geoff, Fairway Phil, Warren and Murray Edgar cleaned up the first set with a very impressive 36 points. Not quite a record but close.
Then team Jamie got to work with Jamie, Bruce Carvell, Eddie and Kallum vacuuming up the remaining dollars with 44 points and 48 points respectively. But Jamie had a sheepish look on his face.
Here's the back story. Jamie had won about 3 million Pro V1s over the weekend on the Southern Swing. His bag was so heavy with new sparklers he could hardly carry it. Playing Tipperary he pounded a drive down the middle to the top of the hill and was then contemplating his second shot. Power equals distance. But then Jamie got stage fright and was worried about pulling the ball left into the trees and in doing so he was worried he might not find his sparkly white golf ball. So he changed his ball for one which had been round the block a few times. We needed a ruling and the R and A website advises of this accordingly.
RULE 14.2a
Original Ball Must Be Used
The original ball must be used when replacing a ball.
Exception – Another Ball May Be Used When:
The original ball cannot be recovered with reasonable effort and in a few seconds, so long as the player did not deliberately cause the ball to become unrecoverable,
The original ball is cut or cracked (see Rule 4.2c),
Play resumes after it had been stopped (see Rule 5.7d), or
The original ball was played by another player as a wrong ball (see Rule 6.3c(2)).
Now we can see that Rule 14.2a has indeed been breached as there is no allowance in golf to substitute your ball mid-hole for fear of losing it. Even if you ask your golfing partners if it's OK to change your ball it's not OK.
Jamie admitted his mistake and did the decent thing. " I want to be able to lie straight in bed tonight and go to sleep peacefully" he declared. Fair enough. The prize money for that set of 6 went to the Longest Day fund raiser. Jamie remember BE A MAN.
Talking of rules I'm always a bit taken aback when someone putting on the green with another ball close by shouts out " I'll take that ball as marked". Same same, I don't think you can allow yourself to break the rules. If when putting your ball and it strikes the other ball, then it's a penalty on you.
Winners Are Grinners
By recent tradition, the winner of the Christmas Jacket on the Wednesday before the end of year party gets to wear the jacket on the Friday.
Let's be honest, there will be that much dodgy clothing on display on Friday night that Phil will hardly get noticed. For the record this is Phil's third Jacket of the year and his second in the last 4 weeks. He's on a hot run of form and 42 points was a great effort.
With 3 birdies and 38 points, Murray edged his way for another night out in Balclutha. Hey Murray, if you take your car with you to Balclutha, remember to stick within the published speed limits. The boys in blue might be out looking for some easy revenue. Just sayin'.
Murray also won the raffle which will go some way in paying for the ticket he picked up hot footing it to Heriot last Sunday. The cop had a sense of humour apparently. Murray was going a bit quick and when stopped by the policeman he was asked " are you having trouble taking off ?".
Very generously we celebrated the recent 76th birthday of the good doctor Sandy and we all sang to wish him a very happy birthday. Thank you sir.
