Success in Shield for Sean

With all the rain gear safely tucked away in the golf bags it was now possible to recognise some of the hardy stalwarts who had bravely peeled off down to their tee shirts in the hope that the good weather would prevail.

With the conditions favouring most people’s game it was expected that scoring would be reasonably high and indeed this was the case with over 30 in the field returning scores of standard scratch (CSS71) or better.

A countback however was needed before Sean Lappin (17) was eventually declared the winner on 41 points.

Sean’s first seven holes all yielded bogeys but excellent pars at the eight and ninth enabled him to finish the front nine on 19 points.

These two pars over the closing holes on the front nine seemed to ignite Sean’s golfing capability as he went on to register straight pars at the tenth, eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth holes. He only picked up three more points at the fourteenth and fifteenth before another exciting par at the sixteenth brought his tally to 18 points with two holes to play.

He managed to bogey these last two difficult holes but was still rewarded with four points to bring his total to 22 for a memorable victory and his named etched on the Hugh Wilson Shield for 2012.

Second place after the countback went to Alan Johnston (20) who had also returned a score of 41 points.

Alan played very consistent golf throughout the front nine and a sprinkling of pars at the fourth, seventh and ninth holes boosted his tally for this leg to 21 points.

His scoring on the back nine almost mirrored the front nine with pars at the eleventh, twelfth and a nett par at fourteenth brought his total to 20 points. Alan will be regretting his double bogey on the final hole that cost him the chance of an outright win.

Conall Kerr (9) was the third challenger in the countback with his 41 points. The front nine saw some superb golf from Conall as he registered pars at every hole for a total of 22 points. This excellent play continued well into the back nine and he looked destined to win when he reached the sixteenth tee and was just one over par for his round. Unfortunately he dropped four shots on the last three holes, which curtailed his points total to 19 and this nudged him into third place.

Kevin Munster (2) won the best gross when he returned 34 gross points. Kevin again produced the goods with just a couple of hiccups on the back nine preventing him from having a perfect round. Two birdies on the front nine helped him to go out in level par and accrue 18 gross points. Four pars and an excellent birdie at the eighteenth brought his gross points total for the homeward leg to 16.

Brendan Lappin (15) was awarded fourth spot with 40 points. Seven pars and a birdie helped him to a well balanced round which he completed by producing 20 points on both nines.

Martin T Boyle (8) took the fifth and final place when he too came in with 40 points, Very steady play from Martin was the key to his round, with the bulk of the scoring coming from twelve pars and a birdie and this also resulted in 20 points for each nine.

Section winners: 0-12, Matthew Madden, 40pts; ,13-18 Eamon Doherty, 39pts; 19-28, Joseph Kelly, 39pts.

There were just seven very profitable twos recorded in the competition.

Thursday sweep: 1st, David Mulholland, 41pts; 2nd, Paul Lavery, 40pts; 3rd, Michael Haughian, 39pts.

Junior results, Thursday: 1st, Patrick Jordan, 40pts; 2nd, Tiarnan Geddis, 40pts.

This Saturday’s competition is the Monthly Medal

Silverwood will be hosting the M.U.S.A. Team competition on Monday, July 30. Silverwood are paired with Lurgan at this venue with their tee-off time at 9.30am.