Whitehead completes comeback

Whitehead completes comeback

Eighteen months ago, the last thing David Whitehead was thinking of was just playing golf, much less winning so it was warmly greeted throughout the membership to see his name back on top of the leader’s board after Saturday’s Stroke Round at the Blue Lake Golf Club.

After a serious health scare Whitehead slowly introduced himself back to his clubs, coming out and completing just five holes or so in his road to recovery.

Late last year he finally had the strength to complete a full 18 so it did not take him long to discover his forgotten form.

Starting with a par showed the talent was still there and although he dropped a few shots ver the outward nine it was a brilliant 39 off the stick on the back nine that secured him the win.

With no red ink to be seen Whitehead added five pars to ensure the swagger and the bragging was well and truly back and welcomed by his playing partners.

No one got off to a better start than A grade winner Michael Dedonatis who only needed two shots to finish his first hole, which looks an easy hole to the big hitters but lurks with danger if you get it wrong.

He quickly followed that up with a birdie on the second which meant he was sitting on just four strokes after two holes.

It was a lot more regulation from then on in with five successive pars and two disappointing bogeys to see him out in 34.

An opening birdie on the 10th had him eyeing off a big win but his putter fell asleep and he could only add pars from then, mixed with three bogeys to complete his round of 71-3-68.

It was not quite as spectacular for Bob White in his round of 76-7-69.

Outward in 39 with four bogeys he went two better on the homeward nine with bogeys at just the 13th and 18th, unfortunately not able to find those elusive birdies.

It was still a strong round and saw him safely take second place from Trevor Little.

Little is another who is inching towards the magical scratch handicap, a solid outward nine of 36 being testament to the style of golf he is playing recently.

Finally scoring his first birdie of the day on the 10th had him looking for a possible win but he faltered to the end of his round with four bogeys over his last few holes, interspersed with a birdie on the 17th and he finished with a nett 70 for third place.

Michael Millhouse is enjoying his promotion to B grade, celebrating with a win.

Surviving a horror run through the mid part of his front nine, Millhouse resurrected his round with four pars over the inward nine for a round of 89-20-69.

Playing off the same handicap of 20, second place getter Cory Davis is improving week after week, also finding himself in B grade.

Turning with 44 Davis was motoring along nicely with pars on the 11th and 14th and hoping to see his round out with a strong finish.

Unfortunately for him, the dream was shattered with double bogeys on the final three holes that bumped him back to second place.

James Roughana’s round was all chocolates or boiled lollies.

Pars on the second and third were followed by a couple of double bogeys to turn with 43 and then after opening with another double on the 10th he alternated pars or bogeys from then on in to finish 84-13-71 and take third.

C grade winner Brodie Dixon was the closest chaser to Whitehead with his round of 98-30-68.

Dixon is never far away from the prize winners and he showed why, bouncing back from a couple of horror holes on the front nine to come in with 47.

Thomas Von Stanke is another who will continue to improve once he gets a little more consistent.

A par on the second showed he has the ability but he needs to find the middle of the fairway more often so that his scorecard reflects that.

His round was still good enough to secure second place ahead of Conway Johnson (21) who is combining fatherhood with golf and three pars on the back nine showed the good times are not far away.

But he did not have it all his own way, having to fend off Graham Johnson in count back.

Bignell was out of the blocks early with three plusses to open his round.

He gave one of them back on the fourth but still managed to turn with +3 and hold bragging rights on his playing partners.

A run of successive halved holes was off set with a plus and a minus on the next two to square the back nine and finish with the same number of plusses he earned on the front nine.

Johnson (20) on the other hand was also on fire early, up +4 after just five holes.

One of each saw him make the turn on that score and eyeing off a win.

He could afford a minus on the 11th which he made up for with a par on the 15th but a follow up minus on the par 3 ,16th ended up being costly, not only putting him back into a count back but also losing that due to the scrub.

It was still a good round of golf for the up-and-coming Johnson.

Ben Gordon flew the flag for the A graders with his superb back nine.

The 8 handicapper was even after the outward nine and quickly fell behind after a bogey minus on the 11th but then produced a brilliant run of birdie, birdie, par, birdie from the 14th onwards to finish +2 and take third.

While he missed out on the win that back nine +2 was enough to take the novelty best back nine prize.

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