It was a fantastic day on the 20th October for our final event of the year. Thanks to Greg Stewart and Byron Bay Golf Club for organising such a great event. Nothing was in the too hard basket for Greg and it turned out to be a great day.

Thank you to all the parents for taking your kids to all the comps throughout the year, we have 3 kids (one started playing at the age of 4) so I know the commitment it takes, but it’s very rewarding once they get older, giving them a skill for life that is not just a sport but can be a useful tool in future, whether it’s just for social reasons, self-challenging reasons, used in their careers or whether they go on and make golf their career.

It’s one of the few games you can continue to play your whole life teaching you a lot about yourself along the way, e.g. commitment, patience and integrity.

For the final event of the year at Byron, well done to the 18 hole girls for beating all the boys. Stella Payne for winning the final 18 hole Gross event, beating Tana who was the Gross Runner-up by just 1 shot.

And well done to Rafael Ovcaric for winning the 18 hole Nett event.

Chloe finally got a win after a great year (another girl also winning the Gross event!) beating Dylan in a count back for the 9 holes. And Connor winning the 9 hole Nett.

 

And to all our players and Order of Merit winners, there were many who did really well over the year with a few special mentions.

5 hole’s

The 5’s have been a mixed bag this year. Peter King down in Maclean is doing an amazing job building from the base with a solid group. We had a few events with over 10 x 5 hole players…with Maclean having a record 15 x 5 hole entrants!! But then on the flip side, unfortunately we had too many events with zero 5 hole entries.

So we either need to drag the Maclean group to the other comps 🙂 … or start building 5 hole groups at all the other clubs, because that’s where it all starts. Hopefully we can do both.

It would be great to start getting a consistent group of 5 hole players entering all the comps, that way we could start a 5 hole Order of Merit!

9 hole’s

Dylan winning the 9 hole Order of Merit comfortably. He had good competition from Zade throughout the year but Dylan’s consistency proved too strong for everyone. Zade’s points were hampered at the end of the year with a broken arm and a few missed events, but he still held in there for 2nd place despite missing quite a few events.

Mex is another one worth a special mention, winning the 9 hole Nett overall comfortably and deciding to play a few of the final events in the 18’s. Mex also did really well in the Far North Coast Primary School Championships at the beginning of August winning the Nett boys. Mex was playing off 29.8 GA at Byron (for 18 holes), whereas at the beginning of the year his 9 hole handicap was 32.5, halving his handicap in a year. He was shooting in the 70’s this time last year and now is consistently breaking 50 (and a 45 somewhere in there!).

And speaking of the Far North Coast Primary School Championships, Savanna won the Gross girls. And then went on to Hunter Valley to play at the Rydges course which she won. Savanna is the 2024 NSW Schools Nett champion.

And Chloe is another one worth mentioning dropping from 25 to 13 this year and regularly in contention for both the Gross and Nett prizes.

Actually there are too many of you to mention as you’ve all started playing really good golf so I’ve really just mentioned the biggest jumps in handicaps.

18 hole’s

Noah is the 18 Gross OOM Winner. Noah has had a great year also qualifying for the state school’s trials in June. With his handicap hovering around scratch, I think he actually hit 0.0 in April this year and shot a 5 under round during the year at his home course.

George and Tana neck on neck, George started the year strong and then missed a few events there…what could have been hey George!!

Tana came 2nd in the Gross OOM, but also won the Nett OOM so she received that prize instead. Tana also qualified for the state schools finals this year.

Luke is the 18 Nett OOM Runner-up, pipped by Tana at Byron. Luke’s GA was 30 at the 1st event in Coraki this year and played off 15.4 at Byron the last event. That’s phenominal to halve your handicap in 8 months during your HSE year while keeping up the studies showing you can do both well.

Events:

It’s the first year we saw the NRDGA Junior Championships held as a 36 hole event, with a good turnout and generally great feedback, making it something special and harder to win with 2 consistent rounds rather than just the 1 round in the past. So when I send out the calendar for next year please keep that weekend in mind so you can plan for it and possibly stay down that way somewhere.

Next year hoping to have 15 events with the inclusion of Teven, which is the 1st 9 hole course to make the Top 100 Golf Courses in Australia. It really is a special course to play. They held the Regional NSW Open Qualifier in August in a 36 hole 2 day event. A treat for our local touring Professionals.

6 players made every event this year, which was 14 events. And another 3 missed just 1 or 2 events.

It’s nice to be rewarded with a win for all the hard work and practice, but it’s not just about scores and skills. It’s about actually enjoying it, friendships and being a good playing partner. Ask yourself after each game if the group you played with would want to play with you again? A couple of good golf movies to watch over the holidays are “The Greatest Game Ever Played” and “Bagger Vance”.

Looking forward to 2025, first event kicks off in February, I’ll keep you updated.

Byron Results:

 

 

ORDER OF MERIT – FINAL RESULTS

18 Hole OOM GROSS:

 

18 Hole OOM NETT:

 

9 Hole OOM GROSS:

 

9 Hole OOM NETT:

 

ORDER OF MERIT – PRIZES

 

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