Minutes of the Members’ Committee Meeting held at 15.30 on 5th October 2015
In attendance:
John McNamara, President (JM)
Stuart Patterson, Captain (SP)
Yumiko Smith (YS)
Steve Cullen (SC)
Mike Munden, General Manager (MM)
Tom Richardson (TR)
1. Opening
JM opened the meeting and apologies for absence were received from Greg Peck.
2. Minutes of Previous Meeting
The minutes of the previous meeting were unanimously approved.
3. Course/Green Committee Update:
Clubhouse
New carpets have been ordered for the clubhouse. The bar and restaurant areas will be re-carpeted first then, later, the hallways, stairs and lower level corridors.
Course
New flagsticks on all holes were replaced with new ones in September.
Hole 10:
The reshaping of the fairway has now been completed and the area re-turfed. It remains cordoned off and marked as GUR whilst the new turf beds in and will be prepared for play at the beginning of November 2015.
The new ladies tee is now completed, plated and already in play for members’ competitions. The RFEG (Spanish Golf Federation) will be coming to MGCC in October to measure the course following this change and the moving of the ladies plates on tees 3 and 16. RFEG will notify the club of any amendment to the ‘slope’ rating for the course.
16th green:
The back left area that was cleared of paspallum grass has been re-seeded and will be playable again by first week November 2015.
This was an experiment for one approach to tackle the incursion of paspallum grass whereby the paspallum areas were killed off the awaiting period to allow the soil to be completely flush and free from the killer chemicals before re-seeding with bent grass. Whilst this has been successful, it was felt that the whole process took far too long for it to be adopted for restoration of the 11th green (which has far more paspallum grass encroachment).
Note: the existence of paspallum grass on a number of the greens was in fact a deliberate move by the greenkeeper several years ago to grow-in paspallum in anticipation of the need for a salt resistant grass that would cope with the change to the recycled water being piped along the coast to be used for irrigation purposes. Whilst this grass is present in a number of greens on the course, Hole 11 has the biggest spread and affects play much more than on any of the other greens.
Hole 1:
More clearly defining the fairway and creating a border of semi-rough has helped reduce the number of balls rolling off the left side onto the driving range.
Out Of Bounds markers
New, large white OB posts have been placed along the course boundaries on Holes 1, 5, 8, 14, 15 & 17. Some of these need re-positioning as there are some places where a ball could come to rest within the bounds of the course – and be playable – that would be lying out-of-bounds according to the alignment of the posts. Green Committee members will work with the GM to get the placements adjusted within the next week.
General
A lot of work has gone into general tidying of the course over the last 2-3 months. This has had a very noticeable effect. In particular :
1. The placement of the short green and white posts to direct the flow of cart traffic has allowed the grass to recover alongside many of the fairways where there had been heavy wear.
2. Recovery of worn areas has been excellent after staking off the area front left of the 10th green, likewise with areas around the tree line to the right of both the 12th and 13th fairways, the latter having been re-turfed also.
3. The overall condition of the fairways has also improved since adjusting the cut-length of the mowers.
Pin Positions
MM agreed to prepare a template for green-staff for the cutting of pin positions on Tuesdays and Thursdays. This will prevent overuse of some areas of the greens and reduce the placement of holes in positions that are not suitable or fair.
4. Members’ Competitions
SP conceded that the changes for the members’ Monday, Wednesday & Friday competitions made in August had received a mixed reaction. In particular, the Friday groupings by draw from 3 pots (Tiger, Fox and Rabbit handicap categories) proved unpopular amongst a number of members (although it is not clear whether this was a majority or a vocal minority) and became extremely difficult to manage for the organizers on the morning of the competition. It was therefore abandoned and replaced with the same system as used for Mondays’ competitions, i.e., the sign-up sheet formatted in 4-balls where members either arrange their own 4-ball group in advance, or place their name on the sign-up sheet either alone or with 1 or 2 other members. Other members will then have the choice to enter their name(s) into the 4-Ball on the sheet.
After a lively debate, the Committee could not find unanimity on the best way forward but decided by majority to keep in place the Monday and Friday sign-up formatted in 4-balls. TR wished it to be recorded in the minutes of this meeting that he was not in favour of this decision.
5. Captain’s Fund
SP presented the Captain’s Fund Revenue/Expense account and noted that the annual income derived from 10 Euros from each of the members’ roll-up competitions was insufficient to cover the expenditure. The most part of the Captain’s expenditure is the cost of the Captain’s Day competition prizes and entertainment. In the year to October 2015, the expenditure will be significantly greater than the income. It was agreed that in roll-up competitions where there are over 40 members participating, the amount retained for the Captain’s Fund may be up to 20 Euros.
6. AGM
The AGM will be held on Friday, 16th October at 3.30pm.
As previously noted, JM has confirmed that he is willing to stand as MGCC President for one more year, until AGM 2016.
The eligibility of a non life member to become Club President in future years will be a proposal put to the MGCC AGM on 16th October 2015.
7. Date of Next Meeting
The date for the next Committee Meeting was provisionally set for 3.30pm on 30th November 2015.
