Stoke Rochford - the aftermath

[viscount17]

Stoke Rochford is a pleasant parkland course literally hidden behind a garage on the A1.
Huge thanks to Greg (GB72) for hosting today's four-ball (more in my case!).
Very pleasant company with Gary (Region3) and bobmac (hereinafter bob). Gary hits one hell of a ball and if that's what he can do with a migraine - watch out!
bob gave tips and quiet suggestions throughout with the result that my chipping improved dramatically by the end of the round - listen to this man, he knows whereof he speaks!

I came away poorer in balls (one loose drive and a couple of wayward irons), richer for the company and the proud possessor of a V-Easy. This will be put to good use starting tomorrow!

Until the next one guys!

 

[bobmac]

Thanks for the game today guys and I hope the tips helped.
I need to get down the gym and do some training to keep up with some of Garys drives today. Awesome.
Hope you enjoy your new toy Steve and thanks again Greg for the invite.

 

[colint]

did you manage to take any photos lads ?

 

[HomerJSimpson]

Good to see a good time was had by all and that there was some decent golf played.

 

[GB72]

BobMac got come photoes (lovely shot or Region3 with Stoke Rochford Hall in the background).

Thanks for the company and for a very enjoyable round and thanks to Bob for the tips as we went round.

 

[Region3]

Warning for the easily bored:- This could turn into an essay!

Firstly the golf.

Thanks to Greg for arranging the game and signing us in, and to Greg, Steve, and Bob for being good company. I unfortunately probably wasn't the best of company (especially in the clubhouse afterwards) due to feeling a little under the weather, but more of that later.

I missed the entrance the first time past. The satnav was telling me to turn off the A1, but I thought "there's no way it's there... that's a garage!"
After I'd u-turned and pulled into the garage the entrace to the club was just after it so eventually got in ok.

On the first tee you can clearly hear the traffic from the A1, but after a couple of holes you forget you're so close to any roads at all.

The course was nice. A bit more open than I'm used to in large parts but there's always just enough features to define the holes, and some truly memorable ones like the par 3 7th where you hit over what must be a 100' deep valley to the green.
A couple of really long 4's too. I'm not used to hitting 3 iron for my second after what I thought was a half-decent drive!

Thanks for the compliments on the driving gents... if only I could be a bit more consistent the handicap will start to come down. I keep geeky stats and I only marked down 5 fairways hit!
Overall I was happy with how I hit the ball, but as usual for someone with my handicap it rarely all comes together on the same day and my chipping wasn't as good as I think it usually is, and I couldn't read a green for break or pace to save my life.
I have no idea how I ended up with 34 putts, maybe it was Greg's generosity with the gimme's

Are the scores publishable? I think I ended up with 82 (43,39) but have no idea about anyone else.

For some strange reason I actually played better once I started to feel unwell. I had a migraine start early into the back nine, and by the time we finished was starting to get quite bad.
As I had what I thought was about 3 hours driving in front of me I left the post match chat a little earlier than I usually would and set off on my way.

Then things started to go wrong in a hurry.

After about 15 minutes of driving I decided I couldn't carry on, and pulled over in the next layby, climbed into the back and laid down on the back seat with my coat over my head (after putting my phone on silent).

I woke up about an hour and a half later. I still had the migraine but it wasn't as bad as before so I decided to carry on.
I took a quick look at my phone before I pulled off and had 3 missed calls from my mate who was already at Yarmouth and expecting me, and a missed call and a text message from my missus after my mate had rang her asking if she had heard from me.
After a couple of quick calls to let them know I hadn't crashed or been bumped off by 3 unknown golfers, I carried on.

As I drove it got worse again. It didn't help matters that after a while the car made a 'ping' noise, and the dashboard light that suggests I need air in a tyre lit up.
I knew I had a 'slow' in my n/s/f tyre that had been losing about 8psi a month, so didn't worry too much as I'd just get some air at the next garage I came across.
Before I came to a garage I felt too ill to drive again, so into the next layby again for another groaning session on the back seat.

Just an hour this time before I felt well enough to carry on again.
As soon as I got up to driving speed I knew something was wrong. The steering was pulling a little too much and was accompanied by a bit more road noise than usual, but fortunately there was a garage after a couple of minutes so I pulled in for some air.
Put my money in the slot, push the inflator over the valve, and nothing. Silly me. I took it off and put it on again, still nothing. I tried it on the rear tyre, psssssssttttt, no problem. Back on the front again, nothing. I guessed the valve was cream crackered, but since the tyre wasn't totally flat decided to carry on, take it easy, and hope for the best.

Needless to say I got about another 20 miles before the steering and rumbling noise suggested that I now had no air at all in the tyre, and I was into yet another layby.
This time I thought that was the end of my efforts to make it to Yarmouth, and also to play in the pool competition that I was fast wishing I'd never been entered for.

Since I thought I was there for the night and was feeling worse again, I decided another half-hour with my coat over my head on the back seat wouldn't hurt before I made some more phone calls to let my missus know I was still ok and my team-mates that I wasn't going to make it.
The difference this time was that I was in a more secluded area, and there were big trees overhanging my car at the side of the road. The constant dripping of water off of them was like Chinese water torture after about 10 minutes of it to a man with what felt like needles through his eyes so I decided to make my phone calls.

Grab my phone, dial the first number... "CALL FAILED, TRY AGAIN?" I checked my signal and where it usually says O2 and the signal strength it said "No Service".
Since being able to use my phone in the morning was quite a big part of my plan, I knew I had to move - at least far enough to get a signal.

Off I went again, only this time at about 20mph with my hazards on. My satnav said 50 miles to go, so since I was moving anyway I thought if I carried on I would get there in two and a half hours, then sort the tyre out in the morning when my brain didn't feel like Swiss cheese.

I made my phone calls to the missus to update her and my mates to let them know I was trying to get there but would be very late. By this time my caravan key had been given to 3 or 4 different people as my ever changing eta had meant so-and-so wouldn't be on site when I got there so they had to find someone else who knew me that would.

All was going (comparitively) well until about 17 miles from the campsite, when the noise suddenly became much louder (in a metallic sort of way), and the left-hand side of my car was bouncing up and down like I had a hedgehog stuck in the tyre! The rim had finally cut through the tyre and I knew there was no way I could go any further, apart from the mile to the next layby.

As I was wondering what to do (stay put, ring recovery service etc) the current holder of my caravan key rang me to ask how much longer I was going to be.
After I explained what had happened (much quicker than I have here you'll be glad to know), he offered to come and fetch me. Not only that, but because he'd had a few drinks his partner would drive his car out to me.

I took him up on his offer after deciding that my car would 'probably' be ok overnight at the side of the road 120 miles from home, and I eventually made it to my destination about 10 hours after I left Stoke Rochford.

For anyone still reading who's wondering why I didn't just change the wheel, I hadn't got the key to the locking wheel nuts. I'd never seen it since I bought the car, and just hadn't got round to sorting it out. Serves me right really that it came back to bite me big time. Could have done without the migraine at the same time though.

Today, inbetween pool matches, one mate called the RAC out on his policy, and another drove us both to my car, which I was delighted to see still had the same amount of glass that I'd left it with and wasn't on fire.

Apart from the golf I had an absolute shocker of a day, but in adversity they say you find out who your mates are, and I had so much help from them, plus all the concern and people saying they'd have come out to me if I'd rang them, that it's offset a lot of the grief I went through.

That must either win a prize for the longest or most boring post ever!! Sorry

 

[colint]

Anybody else want to volunteer scores ? Should be appearing in next months mag

 

[HomerJSimpson]

That was more exctiting than the latest reincarnation of around the world on the BBC

 

[viscount17]

I honestly don't know what my score was - except terrible.
It's a phase I seem to be going through at the moment, got about half a game. But lessons are now in train so there is some prospect for the future.

 

[viscount17]

I've suffered from migraines for years though I rarely get the headaches, just the vision, numbness, dislocation etc. I have on occasion said I'd almost prefer the headaches - not so sure about that anymore!