Month: December 2018

New Rules for 2019 and the truth about provisional balls!

Hope you all had a great Christmas break.

Did I tell you how I love to confuse shop assistants by asking “Do you have this in extra medium”?

Or when a waiter asks what water I would like, I say “Two parts H, one part O please”! 

Or have you been into your favourite golf store and asked for a dozen provisional balls? Which brings me onto the subject I wanted to talk about this week…

As you should know, the revised rules of Golf come into effect on 1 January 2019. See the excellent video on the subject which you can link to from the top of this post or by clicking here. One of the much discussed changes relates to “balls lost or out of bounds”.

  • Balls Lost or Out of Bounds: Alternative to Stroke and Distance:  A new Local Rule will now be available in January 2019, permitting committees to allow golfers the option to drop the ball in the vicinity of where the ball is lost or out of bounds (including the nearest fairway area), under a two-stroke penalty. It addresses concerns raised at the club level about the negative impact on pace of play when a player is required to go back under stroke and distance. The Local Rule is not intended for higher levels of play, such as professional or elite level competitions. (Key change:  this is a new addition to support pace of play)

Firstly, I can confirm that it has been decided NOT to implement this as a local rule at Abridge Golf Club as far as all competitions are concerned. However, in a friendly 4-ball, you could choose to follow this rule if agreed at the start by all players.

Of course this rule change would not be  necessary if golfers used the option to hit a “provisional ball” if they suspect their first ball may be lost or out of bounds. 

Which brings me back to provisional balls. I certainly don’t profess to be a rules expert myself, but it certainly surprises me the number of golfers that don’t follow the correct procedure when playing a provisional ball.

First rule is that when playing a second ball, the golfer must clearly indicate that the ball he/she is about to play is provisional, by saying “this is a provisional ball”. It’s not sufficient to say “[expletive deleted], guess I’d better hit another one” or similar. It’s not up to your playing partners to ask you “Is that a provisional you are about to hit”? If you don’t indicate clearly that you are hitting a provisional, then it becomes your ball in play and your first ball is dead, even if you find it hit a tree and now lies in the middle of the fairway!

Provisional rule basics
If you declare the ball as provisional. If you subsequently find the first ball (and it’s not out of bounds), you HAVE to play the original ball. That’s a nuisance I know, if you have hit your provisional a country mile down the middle of the fairway and your original ball is found in deep doo-doo, but that’s life. Neither can you declare your first ball as “lost”. Although sometimes you might not try too hard to find your first ball in these circumstances, you can’t stop your playing partner/opponent from looking for it! 

If you have omitted to declare the ball as provisional (which you may have done by choice). In this case, your second ball is the ball in play whether you like it or not. If you find your original ball, whether on the fairway or deep rough, you can retrieve it, but continue playing the second ball.

And then finally, there is the American playing golf in Scotland for the first time. After hitting his tee shot off the first out-of-bounds, he asks his local caddie, “Do you have Mulligans in Scotland”?  The caddie replies “Aye, we do sir – but here we call them 3’s”!

Happy and Healthy New Year to you all!

Gary Bronziet
Club Captain

Copies of the revised Rules of Golf Players Edition are available in the club house.

Abridge Golf Lady Captains Blog Stardate 21st December 2018

Well another year is almost over. I have just got used to writing 2018 and now its nearly 2019! We have had a fun filled action packed year at Abridge Ladies Section.

December has been a very busy month for Ladies Golf at Abridge. We stated with the Menorah cup to celebrate Chanukah. In  a very  closely run foursomes golf competition, the winners were Carol Gray and Carole Piper on a countback from Deborah Jacobs and Melanie Schlosberg. We were all treated to festive donuts.

Carol & Carole Menorah Cup Winners

Our fun Putting Princess competition was won by Mandi Barker and Deborah Jacobs and our monthly stableford golf competition was also won by Mandi, who played exceptionally well despite the winter conditions.

Even though it is very wet out at the moment our new Buggy Paths on the front nine at Abridge Golf Club have made sure that everyone has been able to play whatever the weather.

This week we ended the year with a fun filled Christmas themed fun competition and a prize for the best dressed trolley. My thanks to all the ladies who took the trouble to participate, and to our professional Jack Winer for judging the competition.

The Ladies set off to play

Everyone eagerly awaited his judgement and the winning entry went to Alison Levy who won a festive bottle of bubbly. However with the help of the Christmas Fairy all of our golfing ladies were winners resulting in a small gift for all who participated. This was followed by lunch with crackers and chocolate father Christmases and of course mince pies!

Alison with her best dressed trolley

We have enjoyed some really great golf, some fun and great camaraderie. Abridge golfing ladies really know how to enjoy themselves and love playing golf.

We have some very exciting competitions planned for the New Year so we just have to hope that the weather continues to be kind to us.

Wishing everyone Happy Holidays and a great New Year.

Lots of Love

Deborah

Abridge Lady Captain

Fantastic new buggy paths

Dear Lol

Re: Buggy Paths

I congratulate Jeff and his team and yourself on the fine and quick installation of the paths.  I can see multi benefits of having them.  I out-line my views as follows: –

 

1.    The Course will benefit greatly by reducing Wear and Tear especially during the Winter months.

2.    Buggies can be used twelve months of the year.  At the moment, any Buggy user can play the front line twice providing they get a second start time.

3.    The current 10 club Buggies can be used 12 months of the year instead of being laid up from November to March, therefor not generating any income to pay their rental charges

4.    In due course Abridge will develop its standing to a club that can be played all the year round for Buggies and Electronic Trolleys and even Walkers in a comfortable environment (no wet feet or trousers)

5.    From my own experience I have not found it any hardship to walk and play the 90º rule, play is no longer than normal. 4 Ball Times.

Finally, I would urge you to proceed with the back Nine as a matter of urgency so that we can all benefit from the Points outlined.

Once again well done, everyone keep up the good work.

Best Regards

Alan Hopson

Christmas present ideas for golfers that have everything.

Looking for the perfect golf gift this Christmas for the golfers that have everything.

Now that we are well into December and the nights are noticeably shorter, all thoughts are turning towards Christmas and the excitement of receiving that perfect golf present to be opened on Christmas day.

The pro shop team at Abridge Golf & Country Club appreciate that, at this time of year, most golfers are already planning for and looking forward to the new golf season. There will be ideas about new golf clothing & equipment and thoughts on how to improve their game.

So this is the perfect opportunity to kill 2 birds with one stone by visiting the Pro shop and speaking with Jack Winer. They will be bearing special golf shop offers all the way through to Christmas Eve although you will be hard pressed to find any gold, frankincense or myrrh.

You can contact the pro shop team on 01708 688 333 during winter opening hours which is to 15:30 on weekdays and 16:00 at weekends.

Get the perfect gift in time for Christmas

If it’s new equipment you require, there is also no need to miss out on that Christmas day present as the Abridge Pro Shop team are bringing forward the boxing day sales with their very own version of the “12 Days of Christmas”.

Starting on Thursday 13th December there will be special daily offers running right up to Christmas Eve. There is something for everyone amongst the offers which will help those still finding it difficult to come up with good golf gift ideas for that perfect present.

Improving your Golf Game

Jack has put together Christmas Gift Packages for golf lessons to improve all aspect of your game including on course strategy playing lessons and gapping sessions.

A festive gift voucher for these golf gift packages will be provided and can be purchased by visiting the pro shop or calling them directly.

Ladies Golf at Abridge

Ladies Section –   Ladies Captain Deborah Jacobs

The club has a very successful ladies section, running competitions every Tuesday meeting at 9.00 am. They have an annual Charity Day which raises large sums for local charities. If any lady would like to join the section either as an experienced or novice golfer, they will be made most welcome.

Visit our ladies golf membership page to find out more about Abridge Ladies Section.

How to Install the Abridge Golf Club Teamup Calendar / Diary

Installing the Club Calendar on your Mobile device

Abridge Golf Clubs operates an online calendar called “Teamup” as the club diary. The advantages of using this over a traditional printed diary is that events may be added and/or modified throughout the year, and these changes will be immediately viewable by members.

Most members have mobile devices and many will choose to view the calendar on their mobile device. Although it is possible to view the calendar in a web browser on a mobile device, the recommended method is to download the free Teamup app. This may be downloaded from the AppStore (Apple devices) or Google Play for Android devices.

The KEY for the Abridge Calendar is ks19sz33d76mwera7j

You only have to enter the key once.  From then on, every time you open the Teamup app, it will display the Abridge Calendar.

Subscribing to a Calendar

If you already use a Calendar app on your phone or tablet as your personal diary, you can merge the events in the Abridge Teamup Calendar with your own calendar. As events are added or modified on the Abridge calendar, they will be automagically updated in your own calendar!

  • Switch between List, Day, Week, Month views.
  • Select All, or single/multiple sub-calendars.

For full details of all of the features, download the full user guide below.

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