2023 Jubilee Cup Results

Peter Norris says:

Here is S&S review of the event from John Slater.

The 2023 Jubilee Cup was played on 7th September in hot weather at Bramley GC south of Guildford.

Teams of 8 from Surrey & Sussex, Basingstoke, Hursley and North Harbour competed in the annual competition which took the best 7 scores from each team, played to a capped medal format. This means the maximum you can record for a Par 3 is 7 and for a Par 4 or 5 is 9.

It was encouraging that all four societies have continued past the end of IBM subsidy, each charges an annual subscription for membership of their society. Some have become open, in that any guest after playing 3 times with the society can become a member.

The question of open or closed membership is something we will continue to keep in mind. In time it will become the best, if not the only, means to gain new members into the society.

Bramley is a hilly course; the 2nd goes down & up, the 3rd goes up, the 4th crosses the 3rd going down, the 5th goes really up. After that you get a bit of a breather for a few holes before the roller coaster begins again. Handily, the long closing hole is dead flat giving you a chance to get your breath back before lugging your golf trolley uphill to the sloping car park.

A Course Rating of 67.6 against par of 69 and Slope of a miserly 118 must have been computed by superfit supermen.

The holes themselves though, are an interesting mix – back to back Par 3s on the front 9 and a 3,5,3,5 sequence on the back. Some devious slopes and bunkering presented challenges. Putting was tricky with speed and borrow.

However our scores were pretty good, captain Simon Freeland led from the front with a net 65 and everybody else’s scores were net 70-something. All other teams had at least one player with 80-something.

Unbelievably, longest drive was not won by Steve Hards, but by a guy from Hursley off handicap of 10 who outdrove Steve by 30 yards. I was there to see it and it took a mighty heave which, by some miracle, stayed arrow-straight. However, not to be denied, Steve did win Nearest the Pin instead.

In the closest finish ever, we and North Harbour tied on 517 for the trophy. But using the 8th score as a tie breaker we WON due to our 8th score being better than theirs. As Simon told us – every shot counts and if anyone of our team had taken just one more shot for their round we would have lost.

Basingstoke were 529 and Hursley 535.

So we regain the trophy for another year and I’m pleased to say that Simon has agreed to be our captain again. And he doesn’t even have to organise it, having cunningly got the other teams to agree to organise it in rotation, rather than the winning team having to do it.

Congratulations to our team: Simon Freeland, Steve Hards, John Slater, Les Wallis, Roger Scott, John Rogers, Jim Wilson, Peter Breakell.