President:

President Donald welcomed all of us once again to Keysborough Golf Club and the stableford competition for the Ray Underwood Trophy. He asked all present to thank the club for the use of their facilities, and their generous donation of our main raffle prize. The weather turned out to be fine, if a tad cold, and the threat of rain disappeared giving us a fine sunny morning for the golf. The course was in relatively good condition given the recent rainfall, although there was some casual water in areas of the course. Fairways and greens were in good order as per usual at Keysborough. The lunchtime sandwiches were excellent and the clubhouse facilities were thoroughly enjoyed by the members. Donald expressed his thanks to Stan Odachowski, Chris Tierney and George Giles for their excellent company.  Donald expressed his thanks on behalf of the membership, to Captain Harold for the manner in which he organised today's event at such short notice after some difficulties with the original booking at Patterson River. Well done Harold!!

Under the stewardship of Daryl Edwards and John Hiscock our raffle continues to be a successful source of club funds. These funds are used directly to keep our matchday costs competitive (green fees, lunch) so please continue to support our raffle.

Number of Players / Guests:

We had a good turnout today, with 64 players involved in the competition despite there being a fairly large number of apologies. There were 5 guests today, Allen McAuliffe as a guest of Trevor McGilton, Shay McQuade guest of Jeff Taylor, Marg Holden and Beverly Jenkin who were both guests of Harold Hayes, and Peter Rodwell guest of Peter Garbellini. We wish all of our guests a very warm welcome and many years of enjoyable golf at the club should they decide to join up. All the guests received complimentary golf balls as is the custom.

Apologies:

There were 18 apologies this month:
Trevor Bottomley, Rex Buckeridge, Tom Buzza, Laurie Comerford, Gary Finnis, Ian Hoskins, Alex Johnson, Karl Lindberg, Robin Miller, Roland Neef, Ian Richards, Peter Ross, Roger Selwood, Declan Stephenson, Noel Valle, David Vine, Ron Wells and Colin Wiseman.

Starters today:

Donald and the members thanked Alan Millard, Jeff Stevens and Keith Aldridge who got us all away with the shotgun start, in good order. Well done guys! Please take pride in your club and always ensure that you "keep up with the group in front of you". That is the number one priority we have in terms of efficient golf. ('ready golf') Special thanks were given to both Harold Hayes and Peter Ross for their hard work in making the registration of players, and the speedy efficient dispatch of playing groups such a success. President Donald recorded his thanks to both Harold and Peter.

It is important to note that the much improved starting process relies very heavily on members being ready to play at the alloted time, especially those on carts as any delay causes a domino effect on playing groups.  Please be ready for say 7.45am if that is the time advised by the Captain.

As previously mentioned, we cannot proceed without volunteers to run these events every month, so please consider helping out as a starter, as it is a bit of fun and you will get to know so many more members of the club. Please help your Club.

Membership News:

Our next golfing event will be a stableford competition at Churchill/Waverley GC, on Monday 2nd September, 2019 for the Bernie Coyle Trophy.  Will all members please note that we return to our normal tee-off time of 7.15am (following 4 months of winter tee-times). Our Captain, Harold Hayes will advise us as to the time he would like members to turn up to ensure a smooth shotgun start at 7.15am. The booking sheet was circulated during our lunchtime. The online booking system is also available now.

President Donald also reminded us that the recent Winter Classic event at Eagle Ridge GC was won by the team consisting of Donnie Barber, Noel Valle, Warren Stahl and Chris McGeorge.

Donald was delighted to welcome the lady golfers who were present today and he reiterated that all new lady members were very welcome at the Club. Members of the Committee are reaching out to various groups to encourage more participation of lady members as we seek to increase our overall membership.
He asks that members assist this initiative by inviting wives, partners and friends along as guests in the coming months.

CoM Business:

No meeting in August. Next CoM meeting is on Sept 2nd.

Special Achievements:

In the past month or so these achievements were noted;

• Bernie Coyle won both 'C' grade and the overall comp on July 20th at Drouin GC. He had a total of 41pts off a handicap of 22. By the way this score was registered using the 'black' markers on a par 73 course. Well done Bernie!
  
• Don Barrett won the Wednesday comp at Brighton GC with a stableford score of 39pts. Congratulations Don!
• Our handicapper, Ray Desmond had a winning score of +5 at a recent Brighton GC. Terrific golf Ray!

We look forward to more success on the golf course in the coming weeks. Go Vets!

Congratulations to all our Vets winners.
Thanks go to all those who contributed the information.

Vets Web Site :

Our Webmaster, Laurie Comerford is on holiday at the moment. The website continues to underpin the smooth operation of our great Club.  Any ideas or queries?  Please contact Laurie by email .

Members are advised that they can contact all committee members with an email address in the format:
 committee_role@vetsgolf.vic.org.au
Emails sent to these addresses are automatically forwarded to the relevant Committee member's private email address.

As an example and email addressed to:
 secretary@vetsgolf.vic.org.au
will go to Jeff Taylor.

Question time :

There being no member's questions, Donald then handed over to our Captain, Harold Hayes.