Today's round was played in almost ideal conditions. Early to mid 20's and initially, no real breeze to speak of, though it would pick up a little as the day wore on...

After opening with a 3 putt bogey 5 and 2 points, my front 9 was basically an exercise in trying to find consistency. For each reasonable shot I would play, I would also play a reasonably bad one and at the turn, I had managed to bank 16 points. My one 3 point hole (a nice tap in par on the par 5 7th) off set by 3 1 point holes.

After 2 point bogies on both the 10th and 11th holes, a poor tee shot on the 12th saw me take double bogey 6 and only 1 point and it seemed my round was going to stall with only 21 points through 12 holes.

It was all I could do to keep myself in the now, trying hard to forget all that had gone before in my round to date and just keep looking forward.

Another bogey and 2 more points on the par 5 13th brought a smile to my face after my 2nd shot found the trees.

A poor tee shot on 14 was quickly forgotten when I found I had room amongst the woodwork to hit a full S/W and then find the green, only about 15 feet from the pin. My birdie attempt died in the heart of the cup leaving a tap in par and 3 points.

The 15th is our hardest rated hole and today after again finding the trees right off the tee and then getting a lucky break and hitting one hard and finishing centre right of the fairway, my 1 iron second from about 260m away was a sweet shot and finished centre fairway only some 5m from the front edge of the green and with the pin only about 10 feet on the front edge, I was again thinking par and 3 points. However I was wrong. I would chip in for a birdie and 4 points...

My tee shot on 16 was a gem and P/W to the green left me with about 25 feet for birdie. A 2 putt par would result. 3 more points.

My tee shot on the par 3 17th was my shot of the day. Last week, with the hole playing into a breeze, I took 4 iron and punched the ball low into the breeze, right on line, only to take a bad bounce and finish nowhere close. With the pins a little forward today and the breeze a little lighter than last week, I took a 5 iron today and again tried to punch it with a 3/4 swing. Sweetly struck, my ball never deviated from the pin in flight and my initial thought was "No, not long again", however, the ball seemed from 170m or so away to have found the dance floor, the question was just how close.

As we walked to the green, my smile widened the closer we got. On getting to the reen, my ball had pitched about 2 feet past the hole and sucked back to about 8 inches...!!! Tap in birdie and 4 more points. And a ball for the day's nearest the pin...

I don't get the last hole, a shortish par 5, and after a solid tee shot, I was left with 6 iron in to the green. Hit it well, but tugged it a little left. Pin high about 15m from the pin, my chip to the green finished about 15 feet away. Again I would leave the birdie putt short in the heart and tap in for a par 5.

39 points for the day, 23 for the back 9 and 16 points for the last 5 holes. 3 over par 39 off the stick for the back 9.

41 points won the day and I'm still not sure what todays CCR will be and I will have done either 0.6 or 0.9 from the handicap and may be back to 14 next time out.

Will just have to wait until Monday so I can check the Golflink web page.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers