The 5th edition of The TSB Nelson Festival of Golf was held last month in the Sunny Nelson region.

Tournament Director, Derek Drysdale, commented "We have just finished our fifth “TSB Nelson Festival of Golf” and proved to be a great tournament... yet again.

We had 120 golfers from 35 clubs from throughout New Zealand. We were delighted to have 58 returning players this year, as that tells us we’re doing something right. Everyone that plays in tournaments such as ours have some great choices of events to go and play in, so the fact that so many keep coming back to Nelson, is the best compliment we can receive. The ‘newbies' all seemed to thoroughly enjoy their time with us too, with many of them telling us that they had the best time ever at a golf tournament.

The Nelson region turned on some superb weather for the whole week with everyone playing in the tournament being treated to lovely warm sunny days.

All three courses, Nelson Golf Club, Greenacres Golf Club and Motueka Golf Club were presented in terrific condition with thanks going to all the greens staff at all the courses for their great work. Also huge thanks go to the staff and volunteers at each course as their assistance made the tournament committee’s job so much easier in running the days events.

Nelson golf club members were terrific, as they support the tournament very well, with many members donating the use of their trundlers to the visitors.  Others helped out by raking bunkers and ball spotting too. The committee are extremely grateful to all of those volunteers for their time and effort in making the course look as good as it did.

The tournament could not be the success proves to be without our sponsors  and I would like to take time to thank them most sincerely. They are the ones that help us offer such a great array of prizes and deserve all the support that we can give by way of recognition.

Brent Williams, Manager at TSB Nelson has been our major sponsor for the last three years and we are indebted to him for his enthusiasm and support at local level. I would also wish to thank Natalie Hampshire and the national TSB marketing team for all their help in giving us every assistance as we prepared for the tournament. They made it so easy so many thanks to them too.

The support we get from Nelson Regional Development Agency is awesome, CEO Mark Rawson and Lesley McQue have been extremely supportive over the last 5 years and we are incredibly grateful to all at NRDA from whom we received sponsorship funding for this years event.  NRDA is funded by Nelson City Council. The programme’s objective is to stimulate Nelson City’s economy in the shoulder seasons by bringing new spending through visitors coming to Nelson for district events. For further information contact NRDA Chair, Mark Rawson on 03-545-6858.

Other supporters of our tournament are as follows:

TAYLOR MADE GOLF  THE LION FOUNDATION   SHELLEY CARPPE @ MIKE PERO, STOKE  TOHU WINES   BLUEBERRY I.T.  NEW ZEALAND KING SALMON   COUNTDOWN SUPERMARKET TRAFALGAR PARK NELSON  TOTAL GOLF   HELLO WORLD NELSON  COD & LOBSTER RESTAURANT NELSON.   LITTLE INDIA RESTAURANT NELSON   VIC BREW BAR NELSON  THE BACH RESTAURANT STOKE & PACIFIC GOLFER MAGAZINE.

DAILY RESULTS

Monday at Nelson:

We held a Team Ambrose in two divisions but in true Nelson style every team went away with a prize!

Tuesday at Greenacres, the winners were as follows;

Ladies Div 1: Irene Roberts - The Dunes Golf Club

Ladies Div 2: Idrean Conning - Hukanui Golf Club

Mens Div 1: Rod Boreham - Mangakino Golf Club

Mens Div 2: Dave Harris - Taupo Golf Club

Thursday at Motueka Golf Club, the winners were:

Ladies Div 1: Ching Chen Wang - Gulf Harbour

Ladies Div 2: Judith Sowden - Hawarden Golf Club

Mens Div 1 : Anton Currie - Horsham, Downs Golf Club

Mens Div 2: George Maipai - Bottle Lake Golf Club

Friday at Nelson Golf Club the winners were:

The Long putt competition was won by Sun Wei of Titirangi Golf Club. Taylor Made sponsorship allowing the finalists to choose a new Taylor Made putter to use in the final. Sun Wei winning the new Taylor Made putter he used for his winning putt. Thanks go to Gareth Sanders from Taylor Made and Total Golf for their fantastic support to our tournament.

Ladies Div 1: Chris McKenzie - Matamata Golf Club

Ladies Div 2: Amy Li - Gulf Harbour

Mens Div 1: Martin Tribe - Clarks Beach Golf Club

Mens Div 2: John McTeigue - Hawarden Golf Club

The overall winners in each division were as follows:

Ladies Div 1: Vicky Chen, North Shore with 99 points

Ladies Div 2: Amy Li, Gulf Harbour with 98 points

Mens Div 1: Doug Millington, Ngaruawahia with 107 points

Mens Div 2: George Maipai, Bottle Lake with 109 points

TSB NELSON FESTIVAL OF GOLF CHAMPION 2018

Dave Harris, Taupo Golf Club with 110 points.

Congratulations to all our winners and well done to all those that tried their best but came up a bit short, but remember….there’s always next year!

A full run down of all our daily results are on our website, www.nelsongolf.co.nz just click on the Festival of Golf box on the home page and you will find them there. Photos from this years tournament will also be on the website very soon, so watch this space.

Thank you to all our competitors. We look forward to seeing you all again next year and, hopefully bringing  friends and family along too to join in the fun. They will be made to feel very welcome indeed. 

I would like to finish by thanking my hard-working tournament committee and volunteers for all their amazing efforts.