News from the world of Golf
McIlroy for junior Open
Leading young players from 59 countries will compete in the Junior British Open Championships at Kilmarnock (Barassie) Golf Club next week.
Almost half the field of 95 players, aged 16 and below, are competing in the gold category for handicaps of three and under, while the top 14 have handicaps of between scratch and plus three.
When the biennial event was last played in 2002 at Royal Musselburgh Golf Club, Ireland's Cian McNamara won with rounds of 71, 65 and 71.
This year Rory McIlroy will represent Ireland. A number of competitors from 2002 have gone on to represent their countries at the highest level, including Paula Creamer, who played for the winning United States team in the Curtis Cup at Formby earlier this month.
In 2001, with Prestwick, Kilmarnock (Barassie) staged the British Amateur Championship and recently hosted the Scottish Amateur and Ladies' British Strokeplay Championships.
Achill in Irish final again
Achill Island, who won the Irish section of the 3Ts Tournament last year and represented the country in South Africa, are through to this year's national finals.
At Westport recently, where only two clubs got through to the national decider at The K Club's Smurfit Course on August 25th, Achill took second place in the regional qualifier behind Athenry. In another regional qualifying event, at Co Tipperary, Dundalk, Dromoland Castle and Templemore finished level at the top of the leaderboard on 96 points and will also be going to the K Club.
Collins on the double
Darren Collins (St Anne's) became the fourth player to claim Irish Intermediate and Senior Strokeplay crowns when birdie putts on the final two greens clinched the 2004 Strokeplay at St Stephen's, Glanmire, Co Cork.
Collins was three shots behind Frank Dineen with four holes to play of a nine-hole play-off. Dineen (who had birdied three of the first four holes) bogeyed the sixth while Collins conjured up a glorious pitch to the long eighth, to set up a birdie for a two-shot swing.
Dineen fell foul of the treacherous eighth. His tee-shot tangled with a tree left of the fairway and he bogeyed the next to leave the pair level playing the last.
Collins's pitch to the green almost went into the hole before spinning left and finishing four feet away. Dineen found the centre of the green but missed his birdie effort. That left Collins with a left-to-right breaking putt for the championship and he slotted it.
Athlone title for Lyons
Galway's Joe Lyons won the Athlone Senior Scratch Cup on Sunday with a two-round total of 147. After rounds of 71 and 76 Lyons had two shots to spare over Edward Flynn (Mount Temple) and Richard Blaine of Edenderry, who both finished on 149 - two clear of Ger Hall and Pádraig Boyle. Kevin Flanagan from Co Sligo took the nett on 148 after two rounds of 74, one ahead of local Richard Evans with Paddy Egan taking third place.
Gorman tops in Navan
Showing the men the way at the President's Prize last week in Navan was Claire Gorman, who blew the field away with a marvellous score of 47 points to win by a handsome five points.
Other class winners on the day included Mark Geraghty in class one with 42 points, the same score as Jim Flanagan, who won class two. S Cassidy claimed class three with 39 points, and Freda Tighe won the Ladies Prize, also with 39.
Rafter succeeds at last
If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. So they say anyway. Well that could certainly be Maurice Rafter's motto after he won the Captain's Prize at Elm Park recently.
Due to turn 70 this year, he enjoyed his first success in the captain's event when he claimed Frank Gleeson's prize, after coming close on several occasions. He was also runner-up in the President's Prize two years ago.
He qualified comfortably with a score of 37 points and then, in a testing wind, went one better, and his score of 38 points was enough.
Maurice joined the club back in 1962, although it was some years before he actually took up golf.
Back in 2001, his wife, Helen, was Lady Captain of the club.
Staines the Howth king
Hot scoring was the order of the day at Howth on Saturday as David Coleman held his Captain's Prize. Three players had come in early with 41 points and seemed the ones to beat in the hunt for the wonderful bronze trophy.
In the end, however, victory went to 21-handicapper Brian Staines, who topped the field with 42 points, winning over the back nine from Brian Lynch (11). Next were the three players on 41 points: Joe Richardson (10), Cyril Lynch (19) and Eugene Daly (8). Frank Melia secured the gross prize with a fine score of 33 points off five.
Billy Moen won the Past-Captains' Prize, while the two leading qualifiers were Brendan McBride (14) with 38 points on day one and Kieran McLoughlin (16) with 40 points on the second day.
Qualifying for the event had been tough, especially for the first-day competitors, who had to put up with gale-force winds, while early competitors had driving rain to contend with too.
The official cut-off point came at 19 points (it was 29 points on the Sunday), while substitute players on 14 points actually made it through to Saturday's final round.
Meanwhile, the club have just recently relaunched their website. The address is www.howthgolfclub.ie.
Finals drama at Galway
IT was all down to the wire at Galway Golf Club at the weekend as they held the finals of their three major matchplay competitions. Down for decision were the Costello, Hartmann and Club Cup finals. And amazingly, all three finals went to the final hole.
Eventually, Michael Hennelly accounted for John Royliston in the Costello Cup final, Charlie Garrett dispatched Mick Dowd in the Hartmann Cup decider, while Tony Dalton emerged victorious over Gary Burke in the Club Cup.
