Captains’ Drive-in at Letterkenny Golf Club for Ivan Fuery and Jacqueline Ireland

LETTERKENNY GOLF CLUB ‘teed off’ its 2016 golfing season proper when club Captains’ Ivan Fuery and Jacqueline Ireland drove the club into it’s 103^rd year with the help of club President Greg Sullivan.

Whilst finding a better day for golf at this time of year would be nigh impossible, the new driving force behind the club’s future even brought calm weather and sunshine to the first tee.

The competition was played in the now familiar and enjoyable scramble format and the team leading the way back to the presentation ceremony under the captaincy of Celine Bradley was veteran club championship teams stalwart Liam Wiseman and cat 4 regular Michael Mc Daid.

With little to shout about following their outward return of nine pars and a level par thirty six,  it was captain Celine who gave the ‘boys’ a lift when she birdied 10^th, followed by Liam’s birdie at 11^th and with Michael consolidating those with pars at 12^th and 13^th, back to back birdies at 15^th and 16^th set the team up for a possible chance which was ‘nailed on’ when Michael birdied the par five 18^th. With a combined handicap of 5.2, Celine was proud to accept the winners’ accolade with a superb 62.8 gross.

In runners-up position were the formidable double pairs of Sonya Mc Clean, Vera Mc Fadden, Malachy Crawford and Conor Friel.

Taking the turn with birdies at 3^rd, 7^th and 8^th on the card, no doubt the thoughts of winning came to their minds and following the trend with birdies at 11^th & 18^th it was undoubtedly that bogey at 12^th which had them lose out with a final count of 63.2 gross.

In third place was the team of Sarah Buchanan, Mary Fowley, Clifford Malone and Caolan Friel with a return of 63.4.

Sunday 13^th Open had another improving cat 4 member collecting first prize as Garvin Mc Gahey [24] with a springboard of 21pts on front nine giving him the opportunity to man-manage the back nine, duly did what he had to do andreturned a winning score of 41pts.

The club hosts the members St. Patrick’s Day Cup on Thursday with the Shamrock Open on Saturday and the members confined on Sunday 20^th.

In association with Brown’s on the Green, the club bar and restaurant are open on St. Patricks Day, Thursday 17th March. There will be food ‘specials’ available all day and live music from 6-8pm from ‘Raggle Agus Taggle’ followed by the Man Utd vs Liverpool Europa Cup return leg match.