Hikurangi Golf Club has a firm grip on the Le Garth Trophy

Hikurangi Golf Club has a firm grip on the Le Garth Trophy

The Hikurangi Golf club successfully defended the Le Garth trophy for the 15th time on Saturday 24th April when they met a team from the Whangarei Golf Club.

The Le Garth Trophy was donated by Ian Le Garth in 1984 and is competed for on handicap matchplay over 18 holes with 2 Senior, 4 Intermediate and 4 Junior handicapped players from each team. The club that holds the trophy must accept a minimum of 3 challenges each year from clubs in the Northland Region who are placed on a waiting list to play. Ian was a major stalwart of golf in Northland in the 50’s and 60’s, a Northland Rep, played the Garret Shield and was a founding and life member of the Northland Golf Association, vice President of the NZ Golf Association in 1986. He was also a founding member and a life member of the Northland Branch of the Eagles Golfing Society.

Club Captain Darren Bownes acknowledges that a lot of local knowledge gives our team a great advantage (although that didn’t work for the previous challenger - Northland Golf Club - where they stacked their team with ex-Hikurangi players to no avail). With only 60 men players to call on the basic core of the team has not changed greatly since the club first won the cup in December 2016.

A par 70 course of 5256m off the Blue tees, while not long by any standard, accurate golf is needed to score well. The Course is set on hilly terrain with many sloping greens, blind approaches and undulating fairways where players never get a flat lie requiring them to have a good arsenal of shots in their bag. The greens are soil based and beautifully manicured. Hikurangi had a bit of a reputation of being a bit of a goat track, but over the past 10 – 15 years after employing permanent greenkeepers the standard of the course has improved out of sight. Our current greenkeeper has been with us for 18 months and since his engagement the health and standard of the greens has improved greatly as has the overall condition of fairways and presentation of the course. With 360o vistas over the whole course visitors are warned not to be distracted by the views.