May Newsletter

Ladies Captain Report

Captain’s Report May

Autumn is a lovely time of the year for golf, the weather is cooling down and the course is looking good.

April and May are Pennant months with the Easter break in between. We were beaten 4/3 by Morisset at Toukley in the first round and we lost the second match against Magenta at Breakers in the second week.

On Monday 15th April Gosford hosted the pennant teams in the Banksia pool. Thanks to the President and her team for the morning tea and to Sharon Anderson and Marianne for her help throughout the day. Everything ran smoothly and feedback on the course was good.

The 4BBB knockout begins on Thursdays early in May; the draw is on the board. There is no nomination fee and entrants will pay the usual $20 daily competition fee.

Patrons Day was held on Tuesday 23rd April. This event is an addition to the programme and we thank our patron June Bowen for her generous donation of $200 to the trophy pool for the day. The weather was beautiful and we had a reasonable field. We will reassess the schedule next year as the Tuesday after Easter wasn’t ideal.

Our Open Day is on 14th May and planning is well under way. We have a number of visitors who have entered and we’re hoping for a good response from our members. Bendigo Bank are the sponsors of the Event and Angove winery will provide a wine tasting experience to compliment the “build your own sandwich” lunch for the players.

Thanks to Di Beechey for organising the new Ladies Singles Championship trophy. Once the engraving is done it will be ready to show the Ladies. The cost of it will be covered by the money which remained in Chris Shaw’s trophy account which her daughter Kylie so kindly donated.

Helen Potter, Anne Burke, Marianne Lanham and I played 9 holes with our enthusiast Rookies a couple of weeks ago. Helen had prepared an excellent handout on Stableford scoring which she presented over coffee afterwards and she will circulate a summary of the rules to them as well.

The Club Match committee has decided that we, the Ladies must use the same NTP markers as the men, and the Pro Shop must be responsible for them. We are obliged to comply with this ruling and we will have to measure the distance from the pin each time.

There has been some discussion over the past few weeks regarding the bare patches on the greens and whether relief is allowed. A decision was made at the main Match meeting and a local rule will be in play for the next few weeks which allows for free relief from the bare patches on the greens. It has been posted on the notice board outside the Pro Shop; the bare patches have been declared abnormal course conditions.

The double par situation has created some challenges particularly in division 3 in medal rounds. The committee will discuss this at the next meeting and a decision will be made prior to the next round in May as to how the medal, daily and scratch prizes are awarded.

We will adopt a sensible suggestion from Bev Adams to leave a courtesy cart between the 9th and the 18th tees on the ladies competition days for quick access to the bathroom.

The CCWGA team of 16 to play the HRDGA on Wednesday 19th June has been finalised. Helen Potter and Sheena Asken will represent Gosford and Sally Hopkins will represent Breakers.

Our shipment of socks with the Gosford logo has arrived. We plan to use these for trophies and in raffle prizes. We will also look at the possibility of selling them to the Ladies.

The Ricochet clothing initiative has proved to be a great success and will continue until the end of April. Upwards of $400 has been raised thus far. All funds raised will go to our charity, Central Coast Kids in need.

Sheena Asken

Ladies Captain

Men’s Captain Report

Captains Report – May

The cooler weather is upon us and the days are getting shorter. The speed of play is an issue that all members should be aware of. Please make sure you follow the Ready Golf Principles. I would like to thank all members for their patience in regards to the standard of our greens. It is hoped that the issues are resolved and we can look forward to improved greens.

The representative season is upon us with the ladies already commencing their pennant season. The Mens masters pennant will commence on Sunday 5th may at Wyong. I remind all representative players that there is a dress code for all representative players.The junior Encourage shield will also commence next month and we will be entering a team. The state of the junior playing numbers is good in that we will have additional players on loan to form a CCDGA Composite team.

I would like to congratulate two of our Juniors in their recent performance in the Erina Creek Open, Riley Millers won the event at 3 under with Jemison Fitzgerald second at 1 under.

The club has entered into a reciprocal arrangement with Blackheath Golf club. The club is currently reviewing all our arrangements. Should any member have any suggestions please do not hesitate to contact the office.

The local rule regarding abnormal playing conditions is on the local rule board outside the pro shop. This rule is to be used to obtaining relief of the putting greens Members are not required to putt through the damaged areas of the greens.

New honour boards have been installed in club for mens B and C Grade champions since 2005. I apologise to all previous winners as I do not have the records prior to 2005.

WHS rating.

1. Implementation of the new WHS formulas for daily rating – 6am eastern time on Tuesday 7 May 2019

No action at all is required of clubs or of Tier 3 software providers to support the changeover to the WHS daily rating formulas. The changeover is simply something that will happen in the background – the only work required to make the change is to the internal GOLF Link software.
In the short term the daily rating system in Australia will continue to be known as Daily Scratch Rating (DSR). The WHS terminology for daily rating is ‘Playing Conditions Calculation’ (or PCC). The new PCC terminology will take effect in Australia when full implementation of the WHS occurs in late-January or early-February 2020.
The lower limit of the DSR will remain unchanged at one stroke below the Scratch Rating. The upper limit will be three strokes above the Scratch Rating (which is a change from the existing four-stroke upper limit).
The new daily rating system is more conservative than Australia’s existing DSR system. As a result, daily ratings at most clubs are expected to be less likely to move around after 7 May than they have previously. The new formulas have been deliberately designed in this way. One of the anticipated outcomes of the more conservative approach is that equity in competition results patterns across the seasons is likely to become slightly more consistent, which Golf Australia supports. Currently the competitive bias can shift slightly towards higher markers in the summer months in most parts of Australia, and slightly towards the lower markers in the winter months in most parts of Australia.
The WHS daily rating formulas have a similar degree of mathematical complexity as the current DSR formulas. They have been designed by a global group of statisticians known as the World Handicap Research Team (WHRT). Australia is represented on the WHRT. The WHRT believes that the best daily rating outcomes can only be achieved by detailed formulas.

2. Full implementation in Australia of the WHS – to take place in late-January or early-February 2020

When on the course members are reminded of the following

Please repair all divots on the greens
Please take a sand bucket
Please rake the bunkers and leave the rakes in the middle of the bunkers
Please keep up with the group in front
Please stick to the ready golf principles
Please do not drive carts in areas where they are prohibited. Please stay on the designated paths.

Superintendent’s Report

Superintendent’s Report – April 2019

Summary of works

April brought with it 45mm of rain. This is way down on the monthly average, but after last months down pour, we needed a dry month

The average temperature for April was 25 degrees.

With most days around the 25-degree mark and a little rain, all turf areas are growing vigorously. The morning temperatures have stayed around the 20 degrees mark, meaning the disease and insect pressure is still around but not quite as high.

It has been 4 weeks since the greens were renovated, coming back well. Current cutting height is 3mm.

Last week I noticed a disease called Helminthosporium in the greens.

The disease cycle is generally short, as it requires extended periods of leaf wetness to develop and survive. Helminthosporium or ‘Helmo’ is caused by a common and serious group of diseases, attacking a diverse range of warm and cool season turf grasses. ‘Helmo’ can severely reduce the aesthetic appeal of the turf grass and can lead to the need for turf replacement. Helminthosporium can attack turf under a wide range of temperatures between 3Ã??Ã?Â°C and 30Ã??Ã?Â°C, with optimum range between 15Ã??Ã?Â°C and 18Ã??Ã?Â°C. It favours high humidity and therefore thrives under conditions of extended wetness in the leaf canopy. The symptoms of Helmo turf diseases vary, depending upon the specific pathogen, grass species, weather conditions, and cultural conditions involved.

The disease has been sprayed, and there are signs of plant recovery.

As I pointed out last month, we went around to all the greens weaker areas, put out a total of 12kg of PENN A-4 bent seed across all 20 greens. You would notice on most greens, a number of irregular white areas, these areas were where the weed Creeping Oxalis was. In most cases there was enough bent under the Oxalis to recover and fill in, unfortunately in a couple of areas the weed was too thick resulting in bare areas which have been patched or seeded. The whitening of the turf is temporary. The herbicide we use causes a bleaching effect to Bent /Poa turf grass.

The 1st fairway near the 150-meter marker has been built up with a soil and sand mix to smooth out that area. We have then seeded that area with Fescue seed.

We are currently going around all trees with Round up, to stop grass from growing around the trees, another slow tedious job.

Irrigation / Dams

Dam water tested once a month for Salt / Sodium levels. 2nd dam clear, 15th dam clear
2nd dam full
15th dam full

Cart Usage

Please remember to keep all golf carts off the tees and outside the blue lines surrounding the greens. When exiting and entering cart paths please use all sides to enter and exit, thereby spreading traffic evenly. If we adhere to these small rules you will start to see a big improvement in playing surfaces around tees and greens and less erosion or entering and exiting cart paths.

F-Troop May Report

April 2019 has been beautiful warm weather – blue skies and sunshine and not any of the usual Easter wet weather.

Our volunteers this month were very supportive including working on all Public Holidays.

Our projects this month were course clean up and tree maintenance and taking care of OH&S issues.

Our firewood sales are continuing with regular customers getting their orders in early to avoid disappointment when winter finally arrives.

Ongoing maintenance of trees, rubbish and loose timber pickup around the course, watering of the gardens, maintenance to shrubs, hedge maintenance, clean up of the paths and gardens around the clubhouse, wedding garden and practice nets, cleaning of the bush toilets and clubhouse maintenance.

Garden weeding is an ongoing problem and we have been keeping up with that as best we can.

A reminder to Members that the club is running working bees on the first Monday of each month in an attempt to control the weeds that are encroaching the fairways.

If you have some free time on Monday mornings and you would like to contribute to our projects please contact Peter or Jan Martin. We generally work from 7.00 am until 10.30am with morning tea supplied by the club about 10.15 to 10.30 am. We are currently averaging 12/13 volunteers each week which is a big help towards speedy completion of our projects.

Contacts:

Peter Martin 0437 325 207

Jan Martin 0400 430-088