To deal with the effects of a keen overnight frost, I had to run the engine for five minutes before departing for Enville at 7am. Fortunately, temperatures were set to rise, in a plenteous supply of sunshine that heralded the start of spring.
By the time the first teams started at 10am, the course was frost-free and playing well. The dry sandy soil warms up quickly and the greens were presented nicely.
Martin Crossthwaite came all the way from Sicklehome Golf Club, in North East Derbyshire, for a day out and sent me a picture entitled "Carnage on the 9th" - I was in the clubhouse when I received it, and I was most concerned that I had made a mess of allocating start times for this two-tee event. However, on further investigation, I found that the first team, due off the 9th, were 15 minutes late. Furthermore, the second group were also delayed as their fourth man, Danny Alvarez, was waiting to meet them on the first tee. (I believe Danny's school geography teacher wrote on his report "I don't know how this boy finds his way home every afternoon"). Coupled with this Alan Hope's group went from the 3rd green to the 13th tee. Not to worry, the temporary backlog cleared and everyone was happy to be out in the sunshine enjoying this superb course.
It was tight at the top of the leaderboard, with only two points separating the top five teams! Eleven twos were reported, which tells me the greens were pretty good - so yet again we had a most successful visit, to this wonderful heathland enclave, in the most southern tip of Staffordshire.
