What a way to Celebrate!!

Dave Wallace sure knows how to celebrate his Birthday. He recorded his first ever Hole in One on the 4th hole.

 His Derby Team of Peter Garvey, Jim McGilton and Steve Robinson witnessed the fine shot!

Howard Kirke at least got to use the parking spot for a couple of days.

Congratulations Dave!!

HOLE IN ONE

Have you ever let someone play through, only to watch them struggle as they rush to get through the hole? Well Howard Kirke, our own VP-Director of Long Range Planning was asked to play through on hole #12 today. No struggle on Howard's part, he promptly stepped up to the white tee, with a pitching wedge in his hand and just wisp of wind in his face and jugged a....

HOLE IN ONE!

"This is my first HOLE IN ONE in over 47 years of playing golf" Said Kirke, enjoying a ice cold free beverage in the Clubhouse after his round "I think I owe it all to the new lighter golf bag I just picked up today".

Congratulations Howard, your parking spot already has your name on it.

A Touch of Class!

I received a nice note the other day from the winners of the Assistant's Team Championship that was held at Whitevale on May 1st.
It was a classy gesture from the Champs that was worth sharing!

Hi Tony,

I just wanted to thank you for all that you and your course did last Tuesday in the two man scramble event. Working in the industry you realize just how much work goes in behind the scenes to get ready for tournaments and how its not always easy to talk members into giving up your course for the day. Rush and I thoroughly enjoyed the day out there, and were amazed at the conditions of the course. I think my members here at Oshawa are actually tired of hearing me talking about how good the changes and condition was at Whitevale...

Thank you, and hope you have a great 2012 season!

Jake Patte/ John Rushnell
Assistant Pros - Oshawa Golf Club

Men's Opening Field Day 2012

The Men's Opening Field Day was held on Sunday May 6th. The turn out was fantastic with 152 players enjoying one of the best days of the spring season so far.

The winning team of Glenn Davis, Bob Grandmaitre, Stephen Stuart and Art Belanger shot a sparkling 61 for a net score of 57.55. They were 2 strokes clear of second place finishers Fred Calvert, Nick Desimini, Peter Brandt and David Hulme who shot a 59.45. Following closely in third place was Craig Ferns, Ed Griffin, James  Munroe and Hein Ludwig who fired a 59.625.

Brad Hewitt ripping one out there!!

Mike McGarragle providing some chipping advice!

Women's Opening Field Day - 2012

The Women's Open Field Day took place on Saturday May 5th and the 50 players enjoyed some beautiful weather.
The Team of Barb Rogers, Jane Livingstone, Janet Martinko and Theresa Arbuthnot had a score of 64.60 to win the day. Second place went to the team of Lisa Mackie, Mary Charlton, Connie van Dusen and Judy Calder who fired a 66.65. The third place team shot a 67.82 and was made up of Melody Robinson, Susanne Sambleson, Rose Hulme and Dawna Matton.

What's in a Name??!!

Can you name this valued and popular Pro?

Actually the question should be, can you name him correctly?!

It is a great source of amusement for his fellow staff members to hear some of the creative "butchering" of his name.

So far he has been called:
DUNCAN, JUSTIN, DAMIAN, DARREN, DAVID, RUSTY, DARWIN, RUSS, DUNSTIN AND THE LATEST ONE AND MAYBE THE BEST OF ALL - DUBLIN!

Now I ask you - does he look like a "DUBLIN"?

Thankfully he has a wonderful sense of humour and doesn't get too offended.

For those of you who are still confused - his name is:

DUSTIN

Ontario PGA - Assistant's Team Championship

Whitevale Golf Club was proud to play host to the Ontario PGA Assistant's Team Championship for the second year in a row. The Event featured 112 Ontario Assistant's who kicked off their tournament season with a Team scramble event.

The 2012 Championship was awarded to the team of John Rushnell and Jacob Patte. They are both Assistant's at the Oshawa Golf Club. Their score of 63 tied them with the team of Jim and Ron Kenesky. It took a playoff to decide this years event with Jacob Patte hitting a wonderful iron shot in the a difficult pin on the 18th hole.

The players were absolutely blown away by the condition of the golf course and the Association wishes to extend a big Thank You to Blair Rennie and his staff for preparing the Course. Winner, John Rushnell was especially impressed with the condition of the greens.

Our local talent couldn't seem to figure out the greens (so much for local knowledge). Steve and Kevan finished with a 5 under par 67 and Dustin and his partner (Rob Black) recorded at 1 under par 71. Like the Leafs - next year!!

                                         

Weekday Men's Opening Field Day

The 2012 golf season officially kicked off with the Weekday Men's Opening Field Day.
This scramble event had 38 players and the scores were as close as we have seen for this format.

The winning team of Pat Burrell, John McCormick, Tom Kelly and Garnett Graham finished with a total of 62.68

2nd - Paul Lacour, Roy Hamilton and Brian Murdoch had a score of 62.73.

Just a reminder that the Men's and Women's Opening Field Days are this weekend and are open to A, B and C members of the Club. Sign up on line or ask the Pro Shop for more details.

Handicap Posting Season

We have received the following update from the GOLF ASSOCIATION OF ONTARIO regarding the Handicap Posting Season. It deals with scores posted before April 15th. For those of you lucky enough to spend some time down south this winter it also encourages you to post your scores for rounds played while you were away in the GAO handicap system.

The Club's Handicap Peer review will be matching your rounds played with scores entered. This begins April 15th so please ensure that you post all your scores including partial rounds.

GOLF ASSOCIATION OF ONTARIO
Active Handicap Season
 As many of you know, Ontario has an inactive season in which scores are not to be posted for handicap purposes. Ontario 's active season runs from April 15 to October 31 each year. We have been blessed with extraordinary weather this spring in most of the Province (the first time in quite a while) and with it many inquiries have been sent about score posting from both golfers and clubs. As your club is using the "Eagle" version of the national handicap system, our vendor GolfNet will be running a utility today, Monday, April 23 which will filter out scores from the handicap calculation on the system which have been posted from Ontario golf courses during the inactive season. To be clear, only scores posted by members from Ontario courses posted after October 31 but prior to April 15 will be filtered out. For example, if scores were played on Florida courses (as one example) by an Ontario resident these scores must be posted and will count in the handicap calculation, as Florida enjoys an all year round active season. Running this filter on the system will ensure handicaps are accurate, and consistent with the rest of the Province/Country. This will be reflected on your system once an update is completed to the server after Monday.

Why do we have an inactive season?

It is impossible to accurately predict off-season conditions and please keep in mind it varies from region to region and year to year: Thunder Bay , Windsor and Ottawa have three fairly different weather patterns and conditions at the same time of year. Foliage, slower green speeds compared to mid-season, reduced bounce/roll all GREATLY affect a course's difficulty, making courses play much longer compared to mid-season. Turf conditions are generally soft, and rough height is usually short/thin as grasses are predominantly dormant outside April 15/October 31. We also have many temporary greens and tees, sometimes lasting into May. Conditions during winter months are simply too inconsistent compared to the way a course was rated (mid-season), and posting scores played during these times would affect a player's Handicap Factor. This is why an Inactive Season was created (nearly all State and Provincial Golf Associations have them), to help ensure some consistency of when scores would be posted by the majority of golfers, which in turn would help keep handicaps accurate. The GAO Handicap and Course Rating Committee review the Inactive Season dates, and this year will be no different. Our review includes evaluating weather over several years, and noting if a change is warranted. The last few springs have been some of the worst on record, the same holds true of with a few of our falls.

Should you like more information on Active/Inactive Handicap Season and why we have one, please read article #2 at this link:

http://www.gao.ca/index.php/ci_id/1819/la_id/1

We do appreciate your support,

Craig Loughry - GAO
Director of Handicapping
& Course Rating
Golf Association of Ontario






GOLF ASSOCIATION OF ONTARIO
Active Handicap Season - Ontario

We're Ready!

Finally, opening day is mere hours away. Today has been one frantic day as we work towards getting everything in order for tomorrow. Of course nothing can go 100% as planned, our patio awning was being installed on Monday, when the wind grabbed it and tour it in a few places. It's been repaired and they promised to show up first thing tomorrow to install it.

However, the course is just in great shape. We have a few minor flaws that will grow in shortly but for the most part she's ready for play.

#6 looks amazing

Looking down #10

#7 from the back tee deck

Blair getting the putting green set up, this will be a busy place all day tomorrow.

A sneak peak at Friday's pin placement on #1. Mickey swears he will go easy on the first day.