ARE YOU GOOD ENOUGH TO ENTER MOROCCAN CHAMPIONSHIPS?

  The Ocean Course, Agadir - venue for the inaugural Moroccan international women's amateur championship over four rounds from October 18 to 21.

By COLIN FARQUHARSON
Tournament Director
Colin@scottishgolfview.com
The inaugural Moroccan international women's amateur 72-hole championship - which will count towards R&A World Women's Amateur Rankings - will be played at The Ocean Course, Agadir on the country's western Atlantic coastline (terrific beaches there), from Tuesday to Friday, October 18 to 21.
Because competitors will have travelled a long way to get there, we have decided there will be no cut. Every competitor is guaranteed four competitive rounds over a terrific course plus two free practice rounds.
You have to have a handicap of 11 or under on the first day of the tournament. If your handicap is low enough to enter, then it does not matter how young you are.
The winner will received a handsome trophy, a voucher for 500 Euros and a heap of World Women's Amateur Ranking points.
The same week at Agadir, we are staging the first Moroccan international senior women's amateur 54-hole championship at Soleil golf course.
 Again no cut - three competitive rounds guaranteed plus a couple of free practice rounds.
The 50 or over ladies - on the first day of the championship - will also be competing for a trophy and a top prize voucher of 500 Euros.
The seniors' tournament will start on the Wednesday (October 19) and end on the Friday (October 21). The maximum handicap for this event is 18 on the first day of the championship.
+Should your handicap rise above the maximum permitted for either event between the time you enter and the week of the championships, we have another tournament ready and waiting for you.
It will be a 54-hole Stableford, staged at The Dunes course, also in Agadir. Entry to this event will be open to ladies/senior ladies with any handicaps up to and including 36.

+Details of how to enter these events in Agadir, Morocco in October are available on the Menara Travel Ltd website: www.morocco4golf.com

The cost of flights, transfers, hotel accommodation, meals and the competition entry fees is included in a package price offered by Mohamed Fakir of Menara Travel. If you decide to go, simply E-mail him and he will fix you up with everything.

Golf du Soleil course at Agadir, Morocco - venue for the first Moroccan international senior women's amateur championship over three rounds from October 19 to 21.

Where are they now? Last GB and I team to win Curtis Cup in 1996

By COLIN FARQUHARSON (Colin@scottishgolfview.com)
They are the last Great Britain and Ireland team to win the Curtis Cup – and they are all 14 years older than they were when I took the picture at Killarney, Ireland on June 22, 1996.
Kneeling (left to right): Mhairi McKay (Scotland), Karen Stupples (England), team captain Ita Butler (Ireland), Elaine Ratcliffe (England), Lisa Dermott (Wales).
Standing (l to r): Lisa (Walton) Educate (England), Janice Moodie (Scotland), Alison (Rose) Davidson (Scotland), coach Mickey Walker (England), Julie (Wade) Otto (England), team manager Gladys Cadden (Scotland).
In case you’ve forgotten, here is how the two-day match unfolded:
Day 1 Foursomes (1 ½-1 ½)
Educate and Wade lost to Kelli Kuehne and Ellen Port 2 and 1.
Dermott and Rose bt Brenda Corrie Kuehn and Maria Jemsek 3 and 1.
McKay and Moodie halved with Cristie Kerr and Carol Semple Thompson.
Day 1 Singles (4 ½-1 ½)
Wade lost to Sarah Lebrun Ingram 4 and 2.
Stupples bt Kellee Booth 3 and 2.
Rose bt Kuehn 5 and 4.
Ratcliffe halved with Jemsek
McKay beat Kerr 1 hole.
Moodie bt Thompson 3 and 1.
End of Day 1: GB and I 6, United States 3

Day 2 Foursomes (2-1)
McKay and Moodie bt Booth and Ingram 3 and 2.
Dermott and Rose bt Kuehn and Jemsek 2 and 1.
Educate and Wade lost to Kuehne and Port 1 hole.
Day 2 Singles (3 ½-2 ½)
Wade lost to Kerr 1 hole.
Ratcliffe bt Ingram 3 and 1.
Stupples lost to Booth 3 and 2.
Rose bt Port 6 and 5.
McKay halved with Thompson.
Moodie bt Kuehne 2 and 1.
End of Day 2: GB and I 5 1/2, US 3 1/2

Final result: GB and I 1 ½, UNITED STATES 6 1/2


So where are they all now? Well, only Alison Rose, later to become Alison Davidson, and Julie Wade, now Julie Otto, did not turn professional.
Mhairi McKay and Janice Moodie, are both now married, live in America and play on the LPGA Tour of which Karen Stupples is also a member.
Julie Otto has been most helpful in trying to track down Lisa Walton who became Lisa Educate.
Julie reports: "Janice (Moodie) said that she thinks Lisa is working at Los Altos Country Club, Los Altos in California as an assistant to Brian Inkster (Juli Inkster's husband). Janice thinks Lisa has remarried and, looking at the LPGA website, there is a teaching pro at the Los Altos Club by the name of Lisa Johnson. I have sent an email in the hope that we have traced her! No reply yet." 
Lisa Dermott's last work place that I can trace was at the Ellesmere Port Golf Club and driving range in the South Wirral, Cheshire.
Elaine Ratcliffe plays/played on the Ladies European Tour.
Alison Davidson, another big help in putting together this arictle, told me:      "Unfortunately I don't keep in touch with any of the 1996 team although I met up with Elaine Ratcliffe at the 2008 Curtis Cup match at St Andrews."
Perhaps that 1996 team should have a big reunion - on the eve of the 2012 Curtis Cup match at Nairn so that they can pass on to Tegwen Matthews' squad the secret of being able to beat the United States.
Actually Great Britain and Ireland sides did well in the Curtis Cup matches of the early to mid-1990s. They won 10-8 in the 1992 match at Royal Liverpool's Hoylake links, then retained the trophy by drawing 9-9 over the Honors Course at Chattanooga, Tennessee. Then came the big win over the Americans in the so picturesque setting of Killarney Golf and Fishing Club.
Every player in Ita Butler's squad played her part but Scotland's Alison Rose was the heroine with four wins out of four ties - joining the select band of GB and I players who have achieved a 100 per cent record through every session of play in a Curtis Cup match.
Stirling-based Alison Rose, now Davidson, recalls that memorable week in 1996:
"The whole Killarney experience was amazing and something I will never forget. I remember standing on the first tee absolutely petrified, seeing the fairways lined with spectators but I was so determined that I would have taken on anyone that week.
"The highlight for me though was holing the winning putt and the crowd immediately giving a rendition of Flower of Scotland. It made me feel very proud.
"I am sure the whole experience of Killarney gave me the confidence to go on to win the Scottish and British  championships the following year, I suddenly realised that I had the ability to beat anyone.
"Turning pro was never an option for me. I liked my home comforts too much and I'm sure playing golf for a living is much more difficult that playing for fun.
"Got married to Martin in 1999 and we have two children, Euan aged 8 and Cara aged 6.
"Don't play a lot of golf now but still play some county golf and play in club medals throughout the summer, bit I am planning to play in the Scottish championship at Machrinahish in May.
"I have won Stirling and Clackmannan championship six times, I think, and won the East of Scotland championship last October."

Julie Otto (formerly Julie Hall, nee Julie Wade) has lived in Fife for quite a few years since she moved up from East Anglia - Felixstowe Ferry was her club, if I recall - to join the Ladies Golf Union staff and later the R and A.
Julie recaps for the benefit of Kirkwoodgolf.co.uk:
"For my part, as you know I finished playing competitive golf after the 1996 Curtis Cup match, although I made a brief reappearance for the 1997 Sunningdale Foursomes, winning with my good friend Helen Wadsworth (who played in the 1990 Curtis Cup).
"From 1996-2000 I worked firstly as Tournament Secretary and then Secretary of the Ladies' Golf Union, before joining the staff of The R and A in 2000 as Assistant Director of Rules. I was a Rules Official at nine Open Championships from 1998 until my final Open with The R and A in 2006, leaving The R and A to look after our family.
"I married Dr Stephen Otto, the Director of Research and Testing at The R and A in 2003, meeting him on R and A business whilst he was a Technical Consultant to The R and A's Equipment Standards Committee.
"We have three boys, Connor (6), Stephen (4) and Harry (2), and live approximately nine miles outside St Andrews near Anstruther on the East Neuk of Fife."

Scroll down  if you want to read the earlier articles in the "Where are they now?" Series
1 Laura Moffat, 2 Graham Lowson, 3 Mark Pilling, 4 Susannah Laing.

Callum and Clare Marie

 

Congratulations to Callum Macaulay and Clare Marie Carlton who were married on Friday.

Many thanks to Mandy Macaulay who sent the picture.

Good luck to the happy couple!

KARRIE WEBB WINS HSBC WOMEN'S CHAMPIONS IN SINGAPORE

Australia's Karrie Webb made up two shots on long-time leader, Chie Arimura, to beat her by one shot and win the HSBC Women's Champions tournament in Singapore today.

Karrie, pictured, had scores of 70, 66, 70 and 69 for 13-under-par 275 to lift the US$210,000 first prize.
Chie scored 68, 66, 71 and 71 for 276 and earned $132,846
North Berwick's Catriona Matthew's sub-par third and fourth rounds  - she scored 73, 73, 69 and 70 for three-under 285 - earned her a share of eighth place. Catriona earned $36,003.
In contrast, England's Karen Stupples slumped from two opening rounds of 70 to Saturday-Sunday scores of 77 and 74 for 291. She finished joint 24th and earned $13,128.
Taiwan's Yani Tseng, coming into this tournament on a winning roll of four events in Australia-New Zealand, finished third on 278, three behind Webb and two behind Arimura.

LEADING FINAL TOTALS
Par 288 (4x72). Yardage: 6,547.
Prizemoney in US $
275 Karrie Webb (Australia) 70 66 70 69 (210,000).
276 Chie Arimura (Japan) 68 66 71 71 (132,846).
278 Yani Tseng (Taiwan) 70 72 69 67 (96,370).
280 Sun Young You (South Korea) 70 68 73 69 (74,550).
281 Morgan Pressel (US) 73 69 71 71 (60,004).
Selected totals:
285 Catriona Matthew (Scotland) 73 73 69 70 (T8) (36,003).
291 Karen Stupples (England) 70 70 77 74 (T24) (13.128)

TO VIEW ALL THE SCORES ON THE LPGA TOUR WEBSITE

CLICK HERE

Canny Karrie wins 37th LPGA title


By Lewine Mair
Karrie Webb demonstrated precisely the right mix of patience and pluck as she won the HSBC Women's Champions at Tanah Merah, Singapore by a shot from Chie Arimura, the game little Japanese player who had led for so much of the tournament.
On what was a thriller of an afternoon, Webb, who had been three behind leaving the 10th green, was home in 33 to add a 69 to earlier scores of 70, 66 and 70.
The 36-year-old Australian could not have been more right with her Saturday-night prediction that it would be "a battle right to the end." Arimura, in spite of her relative inexperience of playing among the LPGA contingent, refused to go away and missed a 25-footer at the last to force a play-off.
It may have been Webb's 51st title overall but she could not have looked more elated had it been her first which, for the record, was the 1995 British Women's Open championship at Woburn.
"It feels great," she said. "It was a bit of an up-and-down day so I feel very happy to be slinking away with a one-shot win.
"Chie," she said, "handled herself really well and was in with a chance all the way. I know she's won in Japan but today would have been a different feeling. She really toughed it out."
After nine holes of today's final round, it had looked for all the world as if Yani Tseng was going to win for what would have been a fifth week in a row.
Having started the day six shots off the lead, the Taiwanese player had five birdies on the front nine to be out in a five-under 31. At that stage she was ten under par and only one shot to the bad.
Record crowds surged down the 10th to see how she would capitalise on that arresting start but, to their surprise, they did not have to wait long for the first glitch. After Arimura, armed with her hybrid, had hit through the wind to a couple of inches to the elevated 10th green, Tseng failed to carry the guardian bunker and, like Webb, wound up with a bogey.
What made things worse was that Tseng reacted to her clubbing blunder by hitting through the green at each of the 11th and 12th.
She only dropped a shot over those two holes, but it would have felt like rather more as Webb birdied both to seize a share of the lead with Arimura.
By the time Webb had added two more birdies at 13 and 14, the Australian was 13 under par and out in front. Not only that, but she had all the confidence in the world over her six-to-ten footers.
"These putts don't get any easier as you get older," she explained afterwards, "but I work hard on my putting and I've reached the point where I'm pretty sure I can put a good stroke on the ball."
That four-birdie spell should have spelt the end, only Webb herself proceeded to make things more exciting by taking three to get down from short of the 15th green to cut her advantage from two shots to one.
There were birdies all round at the short par-four 16th and pars at the 17th before Webb did what she had to do at 18 in leaving her 30-foot downhill putt stone dead.
Tseng finished in third place on her own, with Webb marvelling at the way she had played on the outward half. "I obviously couldn't see what I was like when I had that kind of confidence but I remember the feeling... You don't think you can do anything wrong."
Asked to pinpoint what if any shot had made the difference to her day, Webb opted for the four-iron she had hit to 12 feet at the 11th. "I had been frustrated at being three behind after my bogey at the 10th but, by the time I holed my 12-footer, I was only one-shot off the lead and on my way."