Happy New Year to all members of Reddish Vale! I hope you have all made a resolution to play more golf and also to play better golf in 2016! Abbie and I are looking forward to the coming season and we look forward to helping you out wherever we can.


 

New Stock 

The new 2016 range of FootJoy shoes is the best range of golf shoes I have seen to date, and lots of new pairs have arrived in your Pro Shop this week. The HydroLite is smart, leather and waterproof at £79.99 and if you are looking for even more stability, I would recommend the HyperFlex at £119.

Anyone who buys a new pair of shoes in January (or while stocks last) will receive three pairs of socks for FREE - just in case you missed out at Christmas!


 

My favourite telephone call of the year was to Tom Arden who is the lucky winner of the Pro Shop Christmas Draw. The Draw has produced a different winner each year so far, and Tom (pictured below) wins a superb Motocaddy electric trolley. There were another nine prize winners too, so click here to have a look at the ten different winners. The draw was very well supported so thank you to everyone who took part and had a go!

John Wright had his 4th hole-in-one on Tuesday. John hit his driver on the 2nd hole and said it went straight in the cup. John (pictured above) was delighted with the finish to his round as he got a one for 5 points.


 

Sun/Mon 27/28 Dec - The Running Stableford played over the 27th and 28th December had a great entry and was won by was won by Alan Jones with 33 points, courtesy of a card play-off from Pete Lamb. Click here for the full results.

Sat 2 Jan - Steve McCann suffered an early blow in Saturday's Texas Scramble when a ball cracked him in the ribs while playing the first. Welcome back to Reddish Vale again, Steve! However, the force of the blow only served to fire Steve up as he ended up as part of the winning team thanks to team members Keith Pownall and Steve Cole. They won with a score of 47.6, beating Phil Houghton, Jack Cooper and Greg Mitchell on a card play-off. Alan Jones, Steve Marsh and Pete Lamb were third with 48.0.

Sun 3 Jan - Josh Tunnicliffe won last Sunday's Stableford, also with 33 points beating the ever steady Dave Hamilton on a card play-off. Click here for the full results.

Wed 6 Jan - 21 golfers took to the course in Wednesday's Stableford which wasn't bad all things considered. Stuart Wilde won with an exceptional 37 points over the 15 holes! Stuart was well pleased and said it was the best he had played for years - three-over-par gross off 11 is not bad! Second? Dave Hamilton of course with 30 points. Click here for the full results.


 

Considering all the rain and the river coming over on the 7th and 14th twice in the last month, the golf course is standing up remarkably well. The flood on the 14th drained away very quickly, the flood on the 7th reduced greatly before Nick pumped the rest away (again). The new bunkers on the 3rd are coming along superbly, we have kept the hole closed to let it recover from the work Nick and his men have been doing over the winter.

We have been taking calls regularly from members of clubs from all over the local area and some from Yorkshire whose courses are either closed or down to 9 holes. It makes us realise how lucky we are to be at Reddish Vale, where we can play golf all year round. I have seen visitors from some of the Mersey courses with mud up to their knees as if they had been mud bogging on a quad bike.

It's not only local courses which are flooding and closed, even Lytham St Anne's and St Anne's Old Links are reducing the number of holes being played and they also have bunkers out of play due to how wet the courses are.