Overnight rain leaving the grid damp led to a cold and windy start to Saturday mornings Grid Pro round five, which took place at Grasslands Driving Range.
“It was a day beginning with a 15-degree temperature and a chill factor of four, with a head wind for most of the day,” said Steven van Zyl, owner of grid pro.
“We knew we were in for a long, hard and cold day.”
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The seniors were first up and were off to a good start.
“The top four fought it out in a single elimination round, with the ever-consistent Johan du Plessis taking the honours over his brother Hennie, with Anton Nel third and myself fourth,” he said.
The main event consisted of eight pros and eight amateurs, with six sets to find the top six.
“The winner of the amateur division was Damian Trollip, who fought back after breaking his driver shaft and still gained the longest drive too,” said Steven.
“He came up against our lefty, Dylan Pinkerton, in a close-fought final to see who would join the pros in the top eight final double-elimination rounds.
And what a double elimination round it was.
“We had a bucket draw to see who would face who in the first four matches and determine a winner for the loser pool.
“Some of our top seeds lost their first-round matches and had to claw their way out of the losers pool to be back into contention for the quarterfinals.”
Juan Nel was one of the top seeds who hit the longest ball of the day against Dylan, the amateur runner up, to go up against Thorne van Zyl.
“It was a close-fought match, which saw Thorne progress to the next round and fight yet again another top seed, Jason Cook, after beating Damian, the amateur winner of the day,” he said.
Marco das Neves won his matches and knocked players down into the losers pool, where Thorne had to battle them to get back into the finals match against Marco.
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“The final was decided and Thorne had to beat Marco twice to win the day, but this did not materialise as Marco took his third win of the season and Thorne his forth second place,” he said.
Jason Vickers leads the GPSA/PLDA order of merit with 825 points and Marco and Thorne share second on 800 points.
“Congratulations to all our winners on the day. We look forward to seeing you all at the next event,” concluded Steven.
The next event will take place on May 29 at Grasslands Driving Range.
