The 2010 North of England Open Amateur Youth Golf Championship was held at Middlesbrough Golf Club this week and Meltham's Jamie Bower was in sensational form just missing out on an unprecedented double but still claimed the Under 18's crown. The prestigious Championship, now in it's 36th year, is recognised by all the golf Unions and the R & A. 132 entrants played for the MacGill Challenge Trophy where entrants must be under 23 years of age on the first day of the 72-hole championship. Meanwhile the Fairweather Salver is awarded to the leading competitor who is aged under 18 years and returns the best score over the 72 holes. Both trophies can be won by a player who is under 18 but entries are limited and balloted to golfers with a handicap of 4 or less.
Meltham's Bower, a Yorkshire Boys player, shot magnificent rounds of 67 & 69 (4 under par) in the Tuesday and Wednesday qualifying rounds to easily make the cut. In fact his put Jamie in tied second place on 136 along with K. Gray (Slaley Hall) and just 1 stroke behind the leader, J Loughrey from Wrag Barn.
In round three, played on Thursday morning, Jamie shot an over par round of 73 but responded magnificently in the afternoon during round 4 to post a superb 4-under par 66. This put Jamie in tied first place with a score of 275, 5 under par, along with 4 other competitors!
At this stage 17-year-old Jamie knew he had won the under 18's Fairweather Salver by 6 shots with his 275, the lowest ever winning score over 72 holes for this competition.
The Captain of Middlesbrough Golf Club, Mr Richard McLaughlan, announced to the waiting spectators that a sudden death play off between the five joint leaders would decide the winner and would be played over holes 1 and 18 continuously until a winner is decided. He said it would commence in five minutes. However, the Captain was then called into the scorers cabin after which he re-appeared to announce that two players were disqualified due to wrongly marked cards. He said that the play off between the remaining three players would start in approx 5 minutes.... what drama !!!
Jamie, a scratch player, was one of those three to contest the play-off and immediately birdied the first play-off hole. He was joined by Ian Winstanley (+4hcp) from Formby Golf Club who also birdied the 323 yard opening hole. Meanwhile the 3rd player only parred the hole and was eliminated.
Both remaining players parred the 373 yard 18th so it was down the first again! Jamie pulled his tee shot into trees on the left whilst Ian hit a magnificent shot onto the green and made birdie to Jamie's bogey to win the title.
Jamie had twice driven the green at the first and in playing the hole six times had four birdies, one par and a five. Jamie came so close to being the first to win both trophies at the same time.
His grandfather Tony said afterwards, "He is not at all disappointed. Jamie is the North of England under 18 Youths Champion, and has probably reduced his handicap to plus 1."
0 comments:
Post a Comment