A change from the usual view of the lovely Salak, the almost as lovely Rancamaya clubhouse

The Day

Thanks to the efforts of long time Tee Setter and Bogor resident, Juergen Degert, the Rancamaya golf course was once again made available to Tee Set at a very affordable rate considering its place as one of the premier private courses in Jakarta.

The club’s management welcomed our 40 players with open arms, although the members straggling in after their morning medal event were less than enthusiastic at seeing our large group crowding out what they consider their personal facilities. Always regrettable to come across such crass rudeness but it’s a feature of life these days it appears.

The day started early for some with a fine big breakfast at Cecilia’s Café on Jl. Ampera to charge up the batteries. Andrew Sincock joining up for his first Tee Set game in 75 weeks was part of the group and even finished his salad when it was pointed out that it might be a long time between meals.

With half a dozen of Santi Miller’s finest pies on-board in case we got lost along the way, the Immediate ex-President of Most Things loaded up the Fortuna with the Sincock family, clubs and secretary Brenda and headed for the Bogor tol. After negotiating some serious macet at the Ciawi toll booth and again at the Sukabumi feeder road intersection, we made the club house in just under 2 hours which all were agreed could have been a lot worse. More on the traffic horror stories later.

The starter was keen to get us out as quickly as possible to free up the facilities for the members and we were more than happy to oblige. The first group teed off before 11:30, the last at 12:45 but this long period unfortunately tends to decimate the 19^th tee numbers. Mini shotgun starts can alleviate the problem but requires more player cooperation and planning than we got. Always difficult to do when the group is split between the practice putting green, the warm up massage rooms and the remainder in the restaurant charging up with food and drink. A real nightmare for those tasked with making the groupings.

With the club members gone, we had the course and the afternoon to ourselves and the light rain on the back nine did nothing to dampen the joy of playing the finest Jakarta area course. In fact the rain cleared the air and we were treated to the vision of Genung Salak and surrounding mountains rising into the heavens like something out of a script from Lord of the Rings. Just breathtaking to see and a key reason why this course is one of the very best in Indonesia.Brothers James and Peter Thio joined us for the first time and we hope they enjoyed the day enough to return again soon – the traffic is seldom that bad guys!

Welcome backers included David McKeown at a startling 110 weeks to take the honours for most weeks away, followed by Andrew Sincock’s 76 and Alan Fenwick at 29. Not so long next time, guys!!

The Play

Bragging rights for the day went to Mel Meeds with a fine 68 Low Net win. Well timed show of form from Mel as we approach Interleague again.

Simon Reynolds is getting ever more confident in his game and took Low Gross again with a jaw dropping 77 off the stick. No longer is low gross the immediate privilege of our lowest handicapper but Sam Westen still got his money back with a 1^st hole sandy nevertheless.

Others in the money were Jiro taking Low Putts with a commendable 27 slaps and Ken Runyon’s 1^st Birdie once we sorted out this was on his first hole played and not hole #10.

There is a very useful legend on  the Tee Set scorecard that says – Hole # above is “as played”- – it might just as well be written in invisible ink for some 🙂

Ah, always nice to meet new people

Geoff Thwaites proved again the theory that improvement on the back nine is directly proportional to the amount of Bintangs consumed while Christian Molau took  1st Par for handicap >= 30 to wisely hedge against the likelihood of an underachievement “award”.

Noemi Roos and  Giovanni Mignano shared Monster Putter with 43 slaps while Andrew Sincock, like Noemi, had to dig deep into Dad’s pockets to find a Rp50K note to pay for his Most Strokes.

Christian Molau wearing that familiar “not another bloody skirt” look as well as the skirt itself ….

The skirts group was small but colourful as you see above. For those unable to recognise the cross dressers, the underachievers today were (L-R) Jaco Zaayman, a Brad Sincock in heavy disguise, Alan Fenwick and Christian Molau,  .

The immediate past President of Most Things brought the event to a close by thanking Juergen for his facilitation and wishing all a safe trip home. By all accounts everyone made it safely although the 2+ hour drive home which left a lot of wives wondering which watering hole their husbands had stopped off at on the way.

More photos of the day on Tee Set’s photo website and fuller, player by player results here.

Tee Set Matchplay Championship

Rounding out the play was Peter Bush defeating Mustafa Baabad 3 and 1 in the only matchplay of the day. Well done Peter, former champion Mustafa is no pushover when it comes to match play, or anything else for that matter.

Next Up

Interleague at Jags (see report from  the last event here) woven into the usual Tee Set and our brave lads up against the highly fancied and league leading Cloggies. Tee Set has always looked good on paper but has not delivered too often but our boys are a handful of very competitive regulars playing competitive golf week to week so the Interleague heavyweights would be best not to rest on their laurels.

Tee off is a late 12:45 but it’s a shot gun start off all holes on the New Course so the round should be quick and green fees a less than usually punitive Rp805K including shared cart.

All Tee Setters will play for all  the usual awards and also get into the Interleague long drive and nearest to the pin awards – and there should be some discounted beer back in the club house after the game to top off the day.

All players, whether or not expecting to play Interleague should register here as usual for a Tee Set Sunday of Fun in the Sun.

See ya Sunday at Jags … Tee Set

PS and it’s Selamat Jalan to them as they set off bravely into the Ciawi night for the long journey back to Jakarta.

…. and its good night to them …