Blankney Golf ClubPRESENT
Ray Harrison (Seniors Captain) – Chairman
John Wood (Seniors Secretary/Treasurer)
and 32 Members of the Senior Section
APOLOGIES
Apologies from: Mike Turner, Andrew Wylde, Stan Poole, Bob Fisher, Bruce Hayes and Gordon Brenchley.
OPENING REMARKS
The Chairman welcomed everyone to the meeting and requested a moment’s silence in memory of members, members’ wives and former members who had died in the year since the previous A.G.M. The Captain asked members to be mindful of those senior members who were currently in hospital, especially
PRESENTATION OF ANNUAL AWARDS
Order of merit: 1st Robby Boyce 62 Points
43 Players 2nd Clive Lewis 61 Points
3rd Bob Manser 53 Points
4th Maurice Smith 42 Points
5TH Steve Bigwood 37 Points
Eclectic Div. A 1st Maurice Smith 59.5 net
27 Players 2nd John Wood 60.5 net
3rd Bob Manser 61.5 net
4th Bruce Hayes 62.5 net
Eclectic Div. B 1st Fred Fox 62.5 net
20 Players 2nd Carl Hill 65.5 net
3rd Ian Smith 65.5 net
MINUTES OF THE 2018 A.G.M.
The Minutes of the 2018 A.G.M. had been displayed for the required period. There being no matters arising they were accepted unanimously by the meeting as a true record on the proposal of Don Ridley and seconded by Peter Kennelly.
SENIORS CAPTAIN’S REPORT
Ray presented the following report:
“I have tried to keep this report short, as we would be in danger of going over old ground, but we have had another reasonable successful year. Unfortunately, like John before me, I have been unable to convince the powers that be to accept the Senior members as an official section and grant us a Senior’s morning for our roll ups, as other clubs have, but we can only keep trying.
Club Competitions
Entries for the Club Competitions were good, and the Qualifiers attracted 45 to 50 players, with the two Medal formats attracting good turnouts.
48 members took part in the Away Day at Laceby Manor in April, and had a very enjoyable day. Thanks to Ian Smith for organising that event. We also have to thank Peter Morley for arranging the Exchange Day at Holme Hall in September. Another very good turnout and a good day out.
This year we were able to play the Senior’s Open on the correct date! If you remember last year poor old John had to re-arrange the fixture twice because of the weather. This year to event attracted an entry of 120 players, and thanks are once again due to John for organising this Annual competition.
As far as the Inter Club matches are concerned, we had a nucleus of 43 members who were willing to turn out and support the Club. Much of the time we were able to field 8 pairs, but it was rather disappointing to only raise 6 pairs for some matches when we have such a large number of Senior members. All the matches were played in good spirit and enjoyed by all. There is a rule at some clubs, that members who lose their games in matches, are fined a nominal sum! I thought of introducing this into our matches, but then on further thought I realised that by the end of the season it would cost me a small fortune, so I dropped the idea. The match results for the season were:- Played 23 (the away match at Seacroft had to be cancelled due to very bad weather) Won 12 – Halved 5 – Lost 6. Not a bad outcome, so it’s thanks to all who turned out for a successful season.
I have a number of people to thank for their support this year
Vice Captain Fred Fox for his help and for organising the roll ups.
John Wood, our Seniors Secretary and Treasurer, for organising the matches and other competitions and qualifiers, and for keeping me on the straight and narrow.
Our Golf Club Chairman, Steve Grundy for his help and advice throughout the year.
Club Captain Al Grieves and Lady Captain Jules Palmer in organising the joint competitions between the Club and Ladies Section.
Thanks also to Mike Merrison for making sure that I got the correct information on the website. At times I’m sure he had to show a lot of patience with me! To Derek Isaac, who organised the Eclectic and the Order of Merit competitions during which has been a very difficult year for him. Also thanks again to Ian and Peter for Away Day and Exchange Day.
On Senior Captain’s Day we had a very good Half way House, thanks to Joyce, Pat and Lynda Ramscar who made everyone welcome. Also to Sarah, who helped to build the ‘Fred Karno’s Bar’ , so that we could serve draught beer.
On behalf of everyone, I would like to thank John Hart and his team for their hard work in providing us with such a superb course to play whenever we turn out. Whenever we have visiting teams, they are always complimentary and enjoy playing a course that is second to none in the county, and probably beyond.
Next year we will have incoming Captain Fred and Vice Captain Robby, and I hope they will receive as much support as was given to me, to make my year so enjoyable. Thank you all.
Finally, I am pleased to report that we raised £780.00 for Prostate Cancer UK which was my chosen Charity. Thanks you all very much for your support”.
SECRETARY & TREASURER’S REPORT
John Wood gave the following report:
“As this will be the sixth time that I have made the Annual Report and as I will once again be combining both of my roles, Secretary and Treasurer and will be using the Income and Expenditure Accounts as the basis for my report please forgive me if it sounds somewhat similar to the previous five, however this is inevitable.
The first event was the excellent Valentines Dinner, organised once again by David Stanley and Nev Scott. The seventy-nine members and guests had a great evening and enjoyed an excellent Dinner, which gave the Section its first opportunity of the year to honour the New Club Captain and our Professional, by inviting them to the event with their partners.
Senior Captain’s Day appears next on my Accounts. We were once again able to provide Ray with his prize fund and half-way house, so that He could welcome and socialize with all the players. Once again the Club supported the day financially contributing £100 to the prize fund. On the day the Captain staged a fun Blind Pairs competition which was won by Bob Ledger and Richard Coles beating Bob Manser and Mike Merrison in a card play off, both pairs having a combined score of 70 points each.
Our one annual away day this year, was held at Laceby Manor where we took forty-eight seniors. The day went very well apart from the Caterers, who forgot that we wanted a dessert, but after much apologising we received a discount. Next year our Captain will be taking us to Kenwick Park on 1st May. So even after paying the £100 deposit to Kenwick for next year the refund from Laceby has resulted in an unwanted profit of £120 on this heading.
Peter Morley organised an exchange day with Holme Hall, the second of what I believe will be at least three. Again Peter’s organisation ensured that the event didn’t cost our accounts anything.
You will see from the Diary that Peter has arranged the exchange for Thursday, 3rd September next year, however I was informed a few days ago that this coincided with Graham’s “Mixed Swing” and as these Swings take precedence over all Club and other golf at Blankney, Peter will have to find another date.
The main event from an organisational point of view was the annual Watson Trophy (The Senior Open). Seventy-three visitors and forty-six members entered in the three age categories, with over half the field in the middle age group 65 to 75. The weather must have been better this year as overall the scoring was much improved over the last few seasons. The winner, Peter Fairhall from Norwood Park scored 40 points to win by one shot from John Spooner (South Kyme) and Dave Holmes (Blankney) first and second in Cat A, and Andy Craft who won Cat B. Phil Hilton (Sleaford) won Cat C (Over 75s) with 36 points beating our own Don Ridley into second place by one point.
For the last two years I have, as seniors secretary, had to take responsibility for running the Club’s Over 55s Mixed competition, Winners in 2019 were Mr and Mrs Tuey from Market Rasen with 48 points.
This year I reluctantly agreed to attempt a team event for Seniors and after a very slow start entries eventually came in and we staged a very successful AM/AM with 21 teams made up of sixty visitors and twenty-four members. Winners on the day were a Blankney Team of Steve and David Toyne accompanied by Ivor Samways and Andy Craft who scored 92 points. Steve also won two of the nearest the pin prizes.
For the first time for many years we introduced compulsory meals for this competition. Thankfully our Catering department excelled themselves and most competitors left having had an enjoyable day and promising to return again next year, we will wait and see.
Both of these Open competitions are entered via the Club’s booking system so apart from monitoring the entries I have no dealings with the actual money coming in or going out. Therefore no mention is made of these competitions in my accounts.
We organised six board competitions during the season. A total number of 338 seniors entered these competitions, which was the second year running, albeit a small one, up by four from last year. The income from those competitions is shown here and includes £42 from the entries to the Eclectic and Order of Merit awarded earlier, the competitions contributed £229.
As with last year all of the winners were presented with their prizes at one of the two Club presentation evenings held during the year. Despite several prize winners not attending, these went very well and it is envisaged that this will be repeated next season, our Winners were as follows:
Ken Williams Cup – Mike Merrison
Stuart Blytham Salver – Peter Morley
Bert Newman Charity Shield – Chris Symonds
Gilliatt Driver – Robby Boyce
Bert Cawsey Cup – Bruce Hayes - Clive Lewis had the best score but was too young to win the Cup
Bert Medhurst – John Hawes
Reg Woolley KO – Bob Ledger
Senior Stroke Play Champion – Bob Manser
Congratulations to them all.
As I informed the members at the 2018 AGM, if I did not receive more than 25 entries into the Knock-out I would dispense with the round of 32. Only 18 members entered, so in the true spirit of the qualifier, we went straight to a last sixteen round, eliminating the last two entrants. With only £36 of entries, I also decided, in an effort to ensure that the Winner and Runner-up got significant rewards, to dispense with prizes for the beaten semi-finalists.
We also ran eight Monthly Qualifiers between March and October, two of which were Medal competitions, the rest being Stablefords. This year’s monthly winners were:
March Maurice Smith 35 points.
April Robby Boyce 39 points.
May Eric Feeney 40 points.
June David Brook Net 71.
July Carl Hill 38 points.
August Peter Oldham Net 67.
September Clive Lewis 40 points.
October Phill Johnson 33points.
(Only seventeen holes, so actually wasn’t a qualifier but still counted towards the Eclectic and Order of Merit).
To clarify; The Vice Captain books tee times for the Qualifiers so that any member over 55 years can turn up on a first come basis making up three balls were possible and playing, then paying £2 in the Club House and entering their scores into the Club V1 system via the Screen in the Bar. However, any Senior member can book their own tee time during the morning of the Qualifier and providing they inform me of their intentions to compete, enter their score before 5.00pm and pays the fee of course, their scores will be counted.
The next item was the Invitation Day, twenty-four pairs entered this competition which once again was very enjoyable. We retained £55. The Prizes were presented after the competition although as with the Club presentation evening several of the winning teams were not represented, which was disappointing however, we will continue with a presentation next season.
The Section played twenty-three (24th at Seacroft was rained off) matches against other Clubs during the season with a £1 per game levy being charged from the players raising £339.00 (£100 less than 2018 and almost £200 down on 2016, due to the continued reduction in the sizes of the teams and number of matches). For 2020 we will introduce home and away fixtures against Norwood Park although these would be for only twelve players per team. I have been given several suggestions about clubs that could be added to the calendar however I have not perused these as our recent Captains have been struggling to fulfil the matches we already have and I didn’t want to put more pressure on our resources. We have had a some new members due to the demise of other local clubs and this could help us to put out full teams. We will monitor the situation as the season unfolds and if the Captain and future Captains wish us to increase the number of matches we will revisit the situation again.
On top of the Captain’s £780 to Prostrate Cancer Research UK, We gave £450 to our list of local Charities and as I didn’t submit anything for my printing cost and Phillip Johnson produced the year books for free we had no general expenditure.
All of this resulted in an Excess of £221.
I reiterate all of the thanks that the Captain has made but must give personal special thanks to; Steve McGinty for all of his help, Phill Johnson for our Directories, Mike Merrison for keeping the website updated with the Competition and other details; Club Secretary Diane for printing the cards and for her help in general, Graham and staff for dishing out those cards and for looking after the cash. A big thank you to Don Ridley for vetting and sorting out the cards after each comp and thanks to Bob Spandler for taking his time to audit my books.
Finally, I must thank the retiring Captain Ray, for his service to the Seniors of Blankney.
I am looking forward to working with new Captain Fred, as I have during this year and his Vice Captain Robby Boyce.
Thank you all
John Wood”
ELECTION OF OFFICERS
Nominations for the election of officers had been on display for the required period. As no alternative names have been placed before the Section the following will be elected:
Captain
Fred Fox Proposed Ray Harrison seconded Peter Kennelly
Vice-Captain
Robby Boyce Proposed Fred Fox seconded Ray Harrison
Secretary/Treasurer
John Wood Proposed Steve Langley seconded Ray Harrison
ANY OTHER BUSINESS
There had been no proposals submitted for discussion in the requisite time scale:
The Captain asked the Meeting if there was anything they would like to discuss:
The Secretary asked the Meeting for their opinions regarding the Whisky Draws which had only been breaking even at most competitions and had fallen well short on that morning’s Greensome.
John suggested that he would like to drop the draw, increase the entry and add this to the prize fund as he had done with the Bert Medhurst (the one weekend Senior Competition).
After an open discussion, Past Captain Ian Smith proposed that the entry fee should be increased to £4 but the extra £1 should be treated as a donation to a charity raffle with one competitor receiving a prize with the remainder going towards the Section’s Local Charities. This was seconded and passed.
HANDOVER OF CAPTAIN
Captain Fred Fox made the following closing remarks;
It is an honour to be this year’s Captain and I would like to say welcome to all our Senior Golfers.
We have also had a number of members join us from various other golf clubs and offer them all a warm welcome and hope they will join us in all our Competitions and Club Matches. Blankney Seniors have a lot of commitments throughout the golfing season, these include matches against other clubs plus Qualifiers and Cup Competitions. There are also Seniors Opens and Seniors Invitation Day of which all Senior golfers are welcome to participate in these matches. Open and Invitation forms are posted on the Senior Notice Board. There will be an exchange day with Holme Hall Golf Club tba, plus an Away Day at Kenwick Park Golf Club 1st May, these are arranged by Peter Morley and Ian Smith, many thanks to both for all their hard work.
Blankney Golf Club has a great golf course managed by John Hart and his green staff who work hard to maintain the course sometimes under extreme conditions, thanks once again to the whole team for their hard work.
Now to welcome Robbie Boyce as Senior Vice Captain 2020, he arranges all our Social Competitions which takes place on Mondays and Fridays each week. These days are a good time for new senior members to meet and play golf with other senior golfers.
I hope you all will have a good 2020 golfing season. Thank you.
Fred Fox Seniors Captain