Balmoral XXIV

Our annual trip to Balmoral on Monday would have been our 25th had Covid not intervened in 2020. Just 7 of us travelled from Banchory this year, including one non-player - Jas - who was unable to play due to his long-term shoulder injury but wanted to walk the course with us and, of course, take part in the social side afterwards.

This outing is our only "invitation" event. Until very recently Balmoral Golf Club remained fairly exclusive, restricted largely to estate employees, each of whom were allowed to invite 3 guests to make up a fourball. Our contact there is former Banchory Squash club champion and now Head Stalker on the Royal estate, Gary Coutts, RVM. He arranges for fellow members to sign us on as guests for a modest fee of £15 per head. These days the club is more open but the standard fee is much higher - £200 for a fourball.

It's always been a pretty boozy outing so we have favoured hiring a minibus to take us there and back which works OK when Gary can get 3 members to play so that we can have 3 fourballs. In fact, he once - in 2023 - managed to get 4 members to sign us on - our largest ever attendance.

Gary Coutts has had knee problems and had to miss out last year - and this year. In fact, he has only played twice since 2018. He did, however, manage to get regular Brian Lees to play with us and he was joined by Michael Muir so we had just 2 fourballs this year. This, however, made hiring a minibus unrealistic financially. Fortunately we had 2 willing volunteers to drive - Keith and Ken.

Here's the team photo in front of the clubhouse on a warm but overcast evening:

Back row - Gary Coutts, Ian Dring & Michael Muir.
Middle - Nigel Meany, Ken Black & Brian Lees.
Front - Keith Gray, Hugh Riches, Ian Stewart & Jas Bhagrath.

Unlike last year we did manage to find the handicap adjustment chart - and what a shock we all got - reductions in handicap of 4 strokes each, which meant that Ian D was playing off one!

Individual and team scores were:

Michael's 36 points off 14 of a handicap was good enough on the day and he became the 12th person to win this event. Not content with that he also got one of the Nearest the Pin prizes (at the 14th), the Longest Drive and naturally he was a member of the winning team too.

Ian Dring got 2nd place with a commendable 34 points and I took the other Nearest the Pin prize at the 11th hole.

The course was looking pretty smart - tidy, well-tended fairways and rough that wasn't as horrendous as we've seen it in the past - but oh, those greens - like putting on Velcro (or through treacle).

As ever, the post-match social went down well. Keith had organised the food and Nigel the drinks. Gary, in accordance with tradition, brought a bottle of malt - Isle of Jura - and very nice it was too. We had thought that, as we didn't have to wait for a minibus, and, with 2 cars outside it might be an earlier than normal night - but it wasn't really. Not as bad as the very early days but in line with more recent years, arriving back in Banchory about midnight. 

Michael's winning score was the lowest in a decade. He's the 5th Balmoral member to win - Banchory has 7 winners so far and the pecking order now reads:

13 Balmoral members have taken part in the outing over the years, and 21 from Banchory. Incidentally, the club has now officially changed its name to Royal Balmoral.