MEMBER NEWS
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June 22 Members’ Newsletter Dear Redbourn Member, Welcome to another monthly edition of the Redbourn Member’s Newsletter. Apologies for it coming out so late, I have been taking some annual leave in North Yorkshire at the start of the month with the family. Swapping Redbourn for a cold, wet beach with rain pouring down and the family just trying to keep their fish and chips dry. Also, please no jokes about there being more sand at the beach than at Redbourn, we are working on it!! Having said that, whether rain or shine, it is a beautiful part of the country that I thoroughly recommend anyone travelling around the UK to visit! Right, enough of that…what’s going on at Redbourn!
Divoting & Pitch mark evening with Free BBQ – Wednesday 22nd June As mentioned in my last newsletter, we are running a Divoting & Pitch Mark evening thrown in with a bit of bunker maintenance on Wednesday 22nd June starting at 18:00 (arrival 17:45). The course will be closed from 16:00 that day to allow for safe working and will be rewarded not only by much improved course conditions, but also a FREE BBQ afterwards starting at 20:00. Depending on how many people we get, we will start from different point in the course, aided by some vehicles loaded with sand and seed, and work our way around hole by. Member’s are more than welcome to bring their partners up as well. All we ask you to do is spread the word of the evening, keep up repairing during your games of golf and I suppose sign up for this evening in either the bar or the board outside the office, so we know roughly how many corn on the cob to get in!
2 REDBORN LADIES SECTION. The golfing season is well underway and we should be delighted with the condition of the golf course at the moment. The environs around the Club House are looking pretty good too! A busy year lies ahead, with a full schedule of events and fixtures for everyone. I do hope that you embrace and enjoy the opportunities available to you. We have held numerous weekly competitions both on Sundays and Wednesdays and inter-club friendly competitions.
Congratulations to Jan Scotchford who won this year’s McMillan Runcie Trophy, with Marie Jacques in second place and Gillian Baars in third.
Despite the appalling weather 6 Ladies played in the Medal Competition on Wednesday 11th May. Congratulations to Sheryl Tye and Bernie Marcus who had a net score of 73. Sheryl won on count back.
This year’s Charity Shield was won by Carol Eaton. Carol and Bernie Marcus had a great score of 38 points but Carol won on count back. Thank you to all the ladies who participated in this event as part of the entry fee goes towards the Captains’ Charity. On Wednesday 18th May, we had our first major competition of the season when a team of 13 ladies and Robin Cheng, challenged the Friars. It was a fabulous day all round with good weather and great company! Unfortunately, we lost but congratulations to Bernie Marcus and Olive Hayward who had the best ladies score, Bernie who won the nearest the line competition on the 12th and Lorraine Hull who won the nearest the pin competition on the 4th. We held a sweepstake which raised £129 for the Captain’s charity! Thank You to all who made this a great day! Our friendly matches against other clubs are a great opportunity to meet new people and play on new courses. Any one is welcome, regardless of your experience...give it a go! On the 9th May a team of ladies played in a friendly match against Harpenden Golf Club. This was in the Match Play format and the result was a draw. A friendly welcome and great fun! On Saturday 14th May, Bernie Marcus, Barbara Smith, Lynne Norman, Sue Wilkins, Lin Taylor, Carol Eaton, Sheryl Tye and Paula Craddock played in a friendly with Mill Hill. This was Match Play format and Redbourn won 2 ½ to 1 ½. On Thursday August 25th the ladies are playing a three-way match at Redbourn with Essendon and Whipsnade. The first tee is 10.30 am and there will be afternoon tea after the match. Sheryl Tye would love to hear from anyone who would like to play in this match. sheryltye5@gmail.com.a great opportunity to meet new people and
3 Our first national competition is to be held on Sunday 12th and Wednesday 15th June, when ladies will compete for a place to represent Redbourn Golf in the PING Competition. This is the qualifying round, where first and second pairs will be put forward to enter into the National Ping Competition.
HEADS UP FOR LADIES INVITATION DAY.
Ladies invitation day provides you with the opportunity to invite a golfing friend to come along for this summer event. The cost is £45 per pair and includes a two course supper buffet. There are lots of prizes to be won!
NEW MEMBERS: Welcome to Samantha Daniels and Lisa Taylor who have joined the Ladies Section.. Samantha and Lisa are 7 day members and will predominantly play with the Sunday Ladies. You are very welcome Samantha and Lisa
Work that is about to start You may have seen dumper trucks and lorries in recent days around the club and on the course. They are currently fixing all the potholes that have been plaguing the track that Redbourn owns, all the way up to the greenkeeping compound. We will also be installing some speed bumps to help slow down the traffic as certain points, but we ask all members to be aware and stop to check when crossing that track as while we want you to enjoy your round of golf, we want you to do so safely. The area to the right of the first tee is due to start being constructed the week commencing 20th which will hopefully finish that area off and allow us to create more of a feature of that area rather than how it is currently. Also, by the end of the month there will be maintenance of 4 existing path complexes on the course. 3rd green to 4th tee, 5th green to 18th tee complex, 6th tee to 17th green, 6th green to 7th tee and 16th green to 17th tee. Also, the introduction of a path complex on the 9th hole, linking up the 2 bridges, which will be re-done, and back up to the path leading to the 10th tee. Alongside the path, we will also we finally re-modelling the channel in front of the 9th, installing a pipe back filling 12meteres of it to create an approach that stills allows for draining, then defining either side with sleepers, shingle the bottom and creating a bit of a feature of it. I am also well aware I need to get some more flowers in the flower bed next to the 18th green!
4 Haydn Drinkwater - Course Manager Update New set verti cutting units have been purchased and will be used to help reduce the seed heads that are evident on greens, this time of year Poa Annua produces seed heads. The verti cutting will help reduce the seed heads and help produce a true playing surface. Once Verti cutting has been done a light top dress will also be applied. Throughout June a liquid fertiliser and seaweed will also be applied onto greens this will help improve sward density and reduce the risk of disease on the greens. Towards the end of June greens will be solid tinned and a wetting agent applied, this will reduce the chance that the greens will get dry patch if this is the case hand watering with a wetting agent pellet will be needed. Tees and approaches had a slow-release fertiliser applied this will release nutrients for the grass plant over three-month period, this will help improve the density and help in repairing and wear areas on tees. Tees and approaches will also be solid tined and wetting agent and seaweed also be applied. Start has been made on edging, stone sieving and topping bunkers up with sand, all par 3 bunkers have been done and the team will move onto greenside bunkers then onto fairways bunkers. With the grass finally growing main focus is to keep on top off the mowing to reduce the chance off grass clippings, every effort will be done to reduce clippings by blowing any away once cut. The areas where damage was caused installing irrigation will be top-soiled, seeded and fertiliser applied to aid recovery. Director of Golf – Steve Hunter Update By the time this newsletter reaches you we should be right in the middle of the golfing season, and I hope you are all playing your best golf, if not let me know!! You will have noticed a lot of new staff faces at the club recently and we are excited with the new staff team we have on board, this includes Eddie and Richard a new course marshals, with Ali and Mia our new range hosts, I’m sure you will be bumping in all the new faces over the next few weeks especially the course marshals who are looking forward to getting to know you all! We have some exciting golf equipment in the shop this year and my custom fitter Charlie Turner is going from strength to strength with his custom fitting prowess, he on available to offer you the very best advice with any of your golf equipment needs. We are also very excited to be purchasing a new custom fitting Trackman unit, this will ensure that we can offer the very best fitting service for all standards of golfer
5 On Tuesday, the 21st of June we have Titleist joining us for the afternoon with one of their bespoke custom fitters, if you are interested in getting fitted with the latest Titleist equipment then we will be happy to get you booked in, these fittings will be free for club members I really enjoyed taking part in the Jubilee Texas scramble last week and I’m very much looking forward to playing in captains’ day on the weekend. The course is in top-notch condition and the greens are running beautifully. With lots of new members joining us over the last couple of years I would urge you to take part in as many of these club activities like these as you can, if you’d like any further information on joining in then myself and Team would be delighted to talk you through the best way to get involved with the up-and-coming events I’m sure I will be seeing a lot of you around the club or on the lesson Tee or even when out divoting on the 22nd of June!! But in the meantime, enjoy your golf and hole lots of Putts :-). Inflation With inflation now almost 10% and the current cost of living crisis both nationally and worldwide, we are working hard to keep our costs as low as we can for you. We have kept the member's guest rates the same this year with no increase as well as membership subscriptions in all categories below that threshold. The driving range baskets have gone up slightly, members still however receiving their +50% top up on cards, and with the cost of food and drink from our suppliers rising we have had to pass on small increases on our coffee bar prices but have checked these with our competitors and still feel we are reasonably well priced. Members again still get their normal 10% discount when using their levy card A Thank You I would like to thank all those members who have re-joined us this season at Redbourn. For those who haven’t, I would like to take a learning point from them, and to understand better how to improve ourselves as a club and make it a second home, like I believe most golf clubs should be for people. I understand that previous months have been testing for some, with course conditions being not ideal and a lot of change happening all around. However, I hope that you can all see the positive work that our staff up at the golf club are trying to achieve, and the direction we would all like to take the club. Thank you for your support again and enjoy your next round of golf!