Weekly Golf Report - 8/3/26

After a ten-year, absence Gary Cleary hasn’t taken long to make his mark upon his recent return to the club, taking out the March Monthly Medal at the weekend.

The man who won five out of six Club Champion titles between 2011-2016 posted a round of 79-8-71 to claim his first monthly medal since August 2013.

Gary finished one shot clear of the A grade runner up in Rochester’s Andrew Purdey who finished with 77-5-72 and Peter Mangan who carded 86-14-72.

While it is great to have Gary (Gavon to some) back at the club and finding something like his best form, the real interest in his comeback centres around his whereabouts since he vanished mysteriously not long after taking out the Valley View Club Championship in 2016.

In the ensuing years a number of rumors abounded as to Gary’s whereabout and these included (but were not limited to) that he had moved to the US to head up Don Trump’s 2016 (ultimately successful) election campaign or fled to Majorca a la Christopher Skase style.

A big Tiger Woods fan, reports swirled around the golf world for weeks that he was at the wheel of Tiger’s car on that fateful day in 2021 while several Elvis-like sightings were quickly discounted as hoaxes.

The only theory that seemed to hold any credibility came in 2022 that he was set to join LIV golf only for his high asking price ultimately leading the Saudis to spend their $140m on Cam Smith!

While Gary has refused to comment publicly on his disappearance, his acceptance speech on Saturday effectively quelled any notion that he had been spending his time frequenting international fashion spots like Paris or Milan.

To the rest of Saturday’s golf other than the aforementioned A grade scores, there was not a lot on the scoreboard to get excited about.

Steve Hammond took out B grade with 92-17-75 while Paul Dickens (95-19-76) got the better of Lindsay Tatterson (109-33-76) in the countback for runner up.

There was also a two-way countback to find the ladies’ winner with Jenni Bauerle (94-16-78) prevailing over Marilyn West (100-22-78).

Peter Mangan headed the list of ball comp winners that also included Kelly Cheong with Nett 74, Miles Gould (74), Kyle Kydd (75), Ash Kuiper (76), David Collins (76) and Lindsay Tatterson.

Andrew Purdey, Steve Hammond and Jenni Bauerle won the Best Gross Score balls.

Peter Sherman (First Tea voucher on the 15th), Pooch McHale (A grade 3rd) and Andrew Purdey (A grade 12th) took home NTP trophies but the B grade and ladies’ fields could not find the target on either the third or twelfth.

Paul Kuiper (13th) and Alan Hausler (9th) won the best second shot balls.

After 120mm of rain over Sunday and Monday the course was closed forcing the cancellation of Tuesday’s comp.

Scoop

 Ladies Wednesday Golf:

Ciavarella’s Betta Home Living were the generous sponsors of last week’s Stableford round.

With the course refreshed by the rain and in great condition players are noticing that there is much less run on the course, which may account for lower scores being returned.

Marilyn West with 34 points had the best score of the day to be the clear winner in A Grade. Two players finished with 30 points and following the count back, Von Morris was the runner up from Tracey Wade who had the consolation of being nearest the pin.

Bev Lyon was the clear winner in B Grade with 32 points. Judy Sutton was runner up with 25 points and Helen Armstrong was nearest the pin.

The winter season gets under way this week with Opening Day.