Abbey golf Pro Am

SUCCESS FOR BROADHURST AND ABBEY MEMBERS!

The 4 star Abbey Hotel, Golf and Spa in Redditch once again hosted a very successful Midland PGA Pro-AM on Wednesday 12th September sponsored by Carlsberg UK.

The shotgun start format saw 18 teams of four consisting of 3 amateurs and 1 leading Midland Professional compete for over £4000 worth of amateur prizes and a £2500 professional prize fund. With the course playing its full length of 6700 yards from the competition tees, the greens running fast and some strong wind, the challenge was set.

Paul Streeter, last year’s Midland PGA order of merit winner looked a good prospect having won 11 times this season on the Midland’s circuit this year with the highlight of his season being a top 20 finish in the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth (earning £40,000 in this event alone) and beating a host of world class players such as Lee Westwood along the way! He could not quite take this form to The Abbey though and finished with a respectable level par 72 (tied 4^th).

Last year’s winning Professional Matt Cort from Rothley Park once again came into this event on form, with 7 victories under his belt already this season including The PGA National Assistants Championship at East Sussex National Golf Resort. Matt’s steady golf and 1 under par 71 eventually earned him 3rd place just behind Ian Wally (Shirland GC) who’s round of 70 consisted of 5 birdies and 3 bogeys.

Former Ryder Cup player and 6 time European Tour winner Paul Broadhurst, playing in this event for the 2^nd year running, had a terrible start to his round (9^th tee) running up a triple bogey 7 after hitting his first drive out-of-bounds! True class shone through in the end however and he played the remaining 17 holes in an incredible 7 under par for a winning professional score of 68 (-4), setting a new course record. In his winning speech he thanked The Abbey for hosting the event and said, “this course gets better every time I play it, the new range opening soon also looks to be a great facility and I’ll look forward to coming back next year".

The winning team with a score of -14 was Abbey club captain John Longley, club secretary David Steane and competition secretary Graham Catt with Professional Matt Cort. All enjoyed the day immensely and will look forward their two night golf break at Kenwick Park as part of their prizes.

 

Coordinator of the event – The Abbey’s Head Professional Rob Davies was delighted with the day, “I’ve had so many positive comments from the Professionals and amateurs about the course, dinner and prizes. I’m very proud we attracted such a strong field of Pro’s, this event has definitely now become a prominent fixture on the Midlands PGA circuit and next year we hope to attract even more team entries”.



Pictured left Paul Deakin from Carlsberg UK (main sponsor of the event) and on the right is the winning Professional Paul Broadhurst