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Early birds and Awali Golf Club tournament directors awoke last Friday morning to peer through the curtains into a fog laden atmosphere. With a delayed start necessary and a field of nearly 100 players, a flurry of messages was sent with the diktat that later tee-off players must allow earlier players to have started their 10th hole before they joined the fray.
It seems that players took heed, and the Heineken Medal competition sponsored by BMMI resulted in everyone managing to complete their round in daylight, with some great scores to boot.
Joo Sik Han, having received his initial handicap from the club only last October, was the clear winner. A deafening roar, as mighty as those heard at the Winter Olympics, greeted his result when hard-pressed tournament director and master of ceremonies at the post-golf presentation, Serwin Rampersad, made the announcement - a stunning net-59.
Also, waving the national flag of South Korea was compatriot Kwang Bok Kim in runner-up place with net-63.
Competent play by Rashid Al Qutami carding a gross-70 saw him adorned with the medal for best gross score, giving the impression that he is a contender for the imminent Bahrain Open Championship.
As part of his speech, Rampersad thanked the sponsors, noting that BMMI, or the company which later became it, had been sponsoring Awali golfing action since at least 1956.
Results:
Overall winner: Joo Sik Han net-59/gross-80, overall runner-up: Kwang Bok Kim (63/83). Flight-1 1st and best gross score Rashid Al Qutami (65/70), 2nd Hussain Salem (68/74). Flight-2: 1st Jo Pawson (64/87), 2nd Bronson John (66/81). Flight-3: 1st Ross Montagu (67/91), 2nd John Parker (68/87), Bhartendu Mehta losing on countback. Nearest-the-pins were won by Ebrahim Al Hashel, Dong Jin Jeong and Jin Keun Kim. Richard Loker won longest putt.
If there are number-nerds amongst you (of course, there are), you may be interested to know a bit more about ‘sub-60’ net scores, which are as rare as a steak just coming out of the freezer.
AGC has reasonably complete records of competition prize winners back to the 1955/56 season, reports the club’s historian Onny Martin. Since that time, a period of 62 years, there have only been 12 previous sub-60 occurrences, Han’s win becoming the 13th. “Of these 13 players, one might surmise that Alan Sheepwash, with a net-59 in the Kanoo Cup of the 2001/02 season was the least happy: Fiona Nottingham came home in the same competition with a net-58,” he revealed. “In a case of bad timing, perhaps Jeffrey Barrett had a reason to be a little peeved too - his net-59 in the Airmech Medal of the 2015/16 season saw him hidden amongst the Flight winners, the overall winner of this competition always being the player with the best gross score.
“But let us put all of this in perspective: the record holder at AGC is Mr. net-55 Greg Barlow, unbeaten since his achievement 29 years ago in the 1988/89 season.”
