McIlroy pinches win after photo finish

Ballycastle Golf Club Competition Report

Patrick McIlroy survived a photo finish to capture the Glens of Antrim Cup at Ballycastle Golf Club on Saturday with a nett score of 66.

The blustery north-east wind once again made scoring difficult but Patrick, playing off eleven, coped fantastically well and completed his last five holes in one under par to pip twelve handicapper Steven McGarry on a better back nine score after he too had recorded a nett 66 in the competition.

Eamon McCarry won third prize in the Glens of Antrim Cup with a nett 67 and Patrick Nixon finished fourth with a nett 68. The day’s stableford prizes went to Stephen Devlin and Sean Brogan each with totals of 38 points.

Gross competition

In the gross competition, Michael Dallat jnr recorded a superb 72 in the tough conditions to win with John Callan finishing in second place with a 75.

Olympic Torch Open Stableford

Donal Gillan found himself on the top step of the winner’s podium on Sunday after the seventeen handicapper carded a total of 41 points to win the Olympic Torch Open Stableford at Ballycastle.

A handful of golfers recorded 39 points on Sunday so count-back was required to sort out the final placings. A superb level par back nine from twelve handicapper Patrick Dallat yielded 24 points and this secured him second place with Chris McCloskey’s 23 point back nine giving him the third prize.

Phil Grundie from Royal Belfast was fourth with Roland Kearns and Danny Taggart in fifth and sixth places respectively. Francis McGinn picked up the gross prize on Sunday with a one under par 70.

Midweek open stableford

The Wright brothers were flying high at Ballycastle on Wednesday with two siblings from Lurgan winning prizes in the midweek open stableford competition held at the club.

Peter Wright, playing off fifteen, recorded 43 points to finish in first place and Daniel Wright, playing off eleven, handed in 40 points to win the fourth prize. Sandwiched between the two visiting brothers were a couple of locals; Francis McGinn, playing off two, was four under par for his total of 42 points to finish second and thirteen handicapper Shane Staunton was third with a score of 41 points.

Winchester Bowl

The Winchester Bowl gross competition has now reached the halfway stage with Michael Dallat jnr opening up a commanding 23 point lead after picking up maximum points for his 72 in the Glens of Antrim Cup. Francis McGinn and Patrick Dallat are currently tied in second place with 83 points apiece. The top 20 and ties on the Winchester Bowl leaderboard after twelve events will qualify for the 36 hole Club Championship.

John Callan’s good score on Saturday added a further eight points to his Golfer of the Year tally and this has propelled him to the top of the leaderboard with 53 points in total. Rory Gallagher is now in second position on 50 points with Michael Dallat jnr and Mel Carleton close behind on 47 and 46 points respectively.

An added feature in this year’s Golfer of the Year competition is that at the conclusion of the 17 events, the top 60 and ties on the leaderboard qualify for the season ending September Playoff Series. This new competition has been designed to generate some interest further down the Golfer of the Year leaderboard. After the Brass Putter on Saturday 15th September those members in the top sixty will have their points totals reset to zero and they will compete against each other over the following weekend to be one of the top thirty scores to make the cut and progress to the Playoff finals held on the last weekend of September.

Marine Hotel Cup

The Marine Hotel Cup takes place at Ballycastle next Saturday. It has been decided to make this year’s competition a stableford in order to break up a sequence of Saturday stroke competitions and also to add a little bit of variety to our fixture calendar. A stableford competition takes place at the club on Sunday and this is also the day our Mixed Foursomes team travel to Ballymena to take part in the GUI qualification event.