Golf/GBCC: After weekend’s golf, a fond farewell to Bob
A busy weekend with a golf course in superb condition and perfect weather to play the game also made it a pleasurable weekend.
On Saturday and Sunday, we held the Men’s Senior Championship, then there was Monday golf along with the Paul Carey Memorial Tournament and on Tuesday the Women’s Interclub.
In the Senior Championship, Jay Sessa successfully defended his title by posting the lowest score ever for a senior champion with a one under par 36 hole total of 139. As you see each week, this member of Long Island’s Stoddard Cup goes against traditional wisdom and seems to get better as the years go on. Congratulations, Jay!
The tournament is run in age flights with the youngest being 50 to 59, where Sessa happens to fall, and of he course took the low gross. Martin Karpeh was 7 under par with 133 and took the low net among these youngsters.
In the 60 to 69 age group, Gerry Jetter shot two fine rounds totaling 159 to run away with the low gross while Kirk Ressler shot not only the low net of his age division but the lowest 36 hole score of the entire tournament with a 131 total.
Lou DiCerbo made his first appearance at the club this year and took the low gross prize from the 70- to 79-year-old guys with his 177. Bruce Dalton is back and capturing titles again with two rounds totalling 138 and good enough for low net among this group. In the 80 and over group, 80-year-old Jim Gibbs took low gross and the mighty Beckwith had to finally bow to someone in this group and took low net honors with 154.
The men also played on Monday morning in their weekly quota tournament. I just told you about Bruce Dalton and here he is, by far the best on this Monday morning with an unbelievable 10 points over his quota. In second place at 4 over his quota was Peter Pettibone; John Doughty was next at 3 over. Dalton did not have to look very far to find two guys to team up with and win the team event. He found his two buddies, Jerry Glassberg and Sid Beckwith, to take first-place honors with a total of one over quota for the team.
Pettibone teamed up with Charles Mahoney and Larry Winston to easily win second place with 2 under quota. Finishing third with a score of 5 under was Jerry Berner, Mike Rouzee, Al Collard and Marc Wein. John Doughty was not so lucky picking his teammates and was out of the money.
MY BIG SENDOFF
What a great party! Saturday night the Board of Directors of Gardiner’s Bay Country Club said thanks for my 50 years of service as the head golf professional at their club. More than 300 people showed up for this affair, on one of the most beautiful evenings the weatherman could have given us.
In attendance were members of the club, as well as friends and golf professionals from surrounding clubs.
I don’t know how they did it, but the clubhouse somehow handled the entire party without using the back patio. It set up with 300 chairs in stadium style and wasn’t used until the final speeches.
Sports celebrity John Feinstein was the emcee for the evening and waived his normal $20,000 fee for a Gardiner’s Bay golf shirt. Speakers included Charles Robson, the 39-year executive director of the Met PGA, Rick Southwick, Jake Card, Samantha Sessa, Father Peter DeSanctis, and my son and daughter, Bob and Nancy.
Of course, I spoke last and warned the people that if they had to use the rest room, to do it then because this was not going to be short. When I finally got the microphone away from John after trying to get it away from him all night, thank goodness he kept his thoughts under 40 minutes since the tape only had 15 seconds left.
Pictures of a young and thinner me were blown up and scattered throughout the clubhouse. Everyone signed a handmade quilt that Barbara Mahoney made herself and presented to me at the podium. A videotape of the evening, over 500 pictures by Judy Card and taped remarks from the guests should last in my memories for a long time.
After 50 years of writing columns off and on for the Shelter Island Reporter, this will be my last about what is happening at Gardiner’s Bay. Like my tenure as the golf professional, I will say the same thing: It was a great run and I did what I enjoyed doing the whole time. I would like to thank the Shelter Island Reporter for allowing me the space and not changing or cutting the things that I considered important enough to write about.
