THE ‘RIVER HOLE CHALLENGE’

The Huntly Golf Club’s Te Ohaki Course provides a lengthy golf challenge at 5,670 meters.

For 8-months a year it looses around 15% of fairway run due to the strength of its rich nitrogen thick

grass. A clay layer 6 to 10 feet below the fairway surface, helps drain nitrogen rich water from

neighbouring farmlands toward the Waikato River. As it flows across the course it feeds the grass

above, providing a lush growth on most fairways. In addition mid-winter river fogs sprinkles water

borne nitrogen onto the course to feeding the grass from above. While most neighbouring

courses brown off to 100% in summer, the course rarely looses more than 50% of its green

colour. The trade off in having a lush surface is the resulting loss of run and the effective

lengthening of the hole slope playing distances, without seasonal adjustment being possible.

This surface richness and lack of run, sees the course playing a mid winter length equivalent of a

black tee course around 6,200 meters in comparison to other courses. During mid winter the club

vets are even forced to resort to play the shorter 4,970 metre yellow course, that itself begins to

plays like its 5,400 metres. The course provides a challenge for even the best golfers most all year

round and few shoot sub par scores. This past year they include 2021 NZ Amateur Women’s

Strokeplay Champion Vivienne Lu, who on her first visit shot a 68 off the white tees. While club

member’s Jimmy Miller, Lucas McKinnon and Murray Liddle have all gone sub par and

Ngaruawahia golfer Jordan Rangihika shot a 66 a year ago.

In an attempt to attract some big hitting low handicappers, Club Manager Russ Ford has recently

established a ‘River Hole Challenge Jackpot Haggle’. The goal is to land on and hold the 459

metre 14th Hole Green in just two shots. While the fairway is pretty much straight from tee to

green, along it’s entire length it has the Waikato River and an out of bounds on the right side,

while on the left there is a 8 foot high flood bank, with plenty of strategically placed trees adjacent

to crucial ball landing areas. In addition the entire fairway has old river bed water flow undulations

with potential for variations in stance. There is the hint of a dogleg left on approach to the green

which is protected on the left front by a shallow bunker and provides a green surface that slopes

from front to back but feeds to the right side where some small trees await the fast rolling ball.

While the green will hold high hit shots, it is the length of the approach shots that makes the high

shot unlikely, unless there has been a massive straight drive to begin with. It is all about accuracy!

The River Hole Challenge is only on offer once a month, on the day of the club’s Monthly Midweek

Open. It has a seperate $10 entry and is underwritten by sponsor Smiths Golf Waikato. So as not

to offend the professional status of Amateur golfers, it will only jackpot to $500 when the pot will

be sealed until its won, while a second pool commences until it replaces the previous won pool..

Two golfers achieving the feat on the same event day will share the current or $500 jackpot pool.

So if you consider yourself a BIG hitter, why not go and give it a go? You might get lucky!