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Club news

From Gemma Smith, Interim Golf Manager: We hope you have all been keeping well. For the third time in less than a calendar year we are faced with more frustrating and challenging times, both in everyday life and within our golf club. 

At long last we have had some great news and we can begin to focus on opening on March 29th. 

Booking will be available to all Members within their current booking times meaning 7-day and Corporate Members on GG membership can book from March 8th. 

Flexible and 5-day Members can book from March 15th; 25-34 year-old Intermediate Members can book from March 19th and 18-24 year-old Intermediates can book from March 22nd.

If you would like to change your category to receive longer lead booking times please contact us in the office.

The steps and dates as set out by the government are as follows:

  • March 29: The golf club reopens for four-balls and takeaway food and drink from Box 19;
  • April 12th: Outdoor hospitality opens for groups up to six people on the patio and outdoor area;
  • May 17th: The clubhouse opens for indoor hospitality for up to six people, 30-person outdoor hospitality and events can start to take place (with limited numbers);
  • June 21st: All areas open without restrictions and large events can take place with no limitations.

Please note that these dates are based on the government guidelines and may change.

 

Elsewhere, refurbishment plans are well underway here at the Club. The St Swithin’s Suite and downstairs WCs have been fully ripped out as you will see from the photos.

Builders are due back on site shortly to move forward with the development, which will be a welcoming space for us all to enjoy over the spring / summer.

We are doing all we can to ensure you have the best facilities when you return to the Club and going forward through 2021. With the latest refurbishment taking place we believe The Bristol Golf Club has a bright future ahead and we look forward to welcoming you all back very soon. 

Golf news

We have, or at least hope we have, an exciting year of golf ahead of us. In spite of the current restrictions, we do have two superb golf courses to enjoy as well as great practice facilities to hone your game for the season ahead. 

The Club is looking forward to a belated Anniversary Week in June, which I know our committee and various Members have been working tirelessly behind the scenes to organise and this is very much appreciated by everyone at the Club.

We also have various Open competitions, matches and regional county events being held at The Bristol Golf Club throughout 2021 as well as the converted annual Race To Le Touquet, which is Get Golfing’s signature event.

Juniors: The Club is now in the happy position that we now have more junior golfers than at any other time in recent years. The Club’s aim is to both nurture and build upon these younger golfers, who we hope will in time become the future and mainstay of our club. Kev Sarney, along with the Club’s coaching professionals, will oversee the development of the Junior section.

With the recent departure of General Manager Matt Basey, the Covid lockdown and furlough period, we are a little behind with some of the administration so please bear with us for full dissemination of information regarding 2021 events.

The Race to Le Touquet

This year we will be running our first “The Race to Le Touquet” where the winners of each section (Men’s and Ladies) receive an invite to Le Touquet at the end of September to play in the Singha Champion of Champions Finals. This is for the winners of each club’s order of merit. The format of each club’s qualifying events is:

  • Both Men’s and Ladies’ events are played on the same day.
  • Winners of each event at the Club receive prizes supplied by Singha.
  • Points are allocated based on where each Member finishes in each event.
  • The number of points rises for each event as the season progresses.
  • There are six events between April and September.
  • The trip to Le Touquet includes travel, hotels (The 5-star Westminster Hotel), three rounds of golf (Le Touquet and Hardelot), an opening cocktail party, and closing presentation banquet.
  • The finalists receive not only the trip but clothing and finalist prizes. The winners of the champions of champions wins an invite to Thailand courtesy of Singha to play golf and entry into an Asia Pro Tour Pro-Am.
  • Both trips include, travel, golf and accommodation courtesy of Get Golfing and Singha.

Historically, Club competitions take place on weekends so that all the different sections — Mens, Ladies and Seniors as well as our 7-day Members who are still working — can join in the fun. Five-day Members are also welcome to play but will have to pay the price of a Member guest green fee.

Both the Men’s and Ladies competitions take place on the same day with the tee sheet interwoven. This will be followed by a fun prize giving and some special offerings from the kitchen and bar to help bring the day to a close. We would also  encourage Members to invite their partners, who perhaps don’t play, to come along and join in the post-golf fun.

The dates of these competitions and more details will be sent out shortly once finalised.

Members will also have the opportunity to travel as a team to play at Le Touquet against the other Get Golfing Clubs. We will provide further details of this in due course.

Subscription news

From Edward Richardson, CEO, Get Golfing: As promised in our email back in January, anyone who has continued to stay with us and pay their membership will receive a credit on their subscription for the period of March 1st to March 28th. 

For a full Member, for example, the way this will work is as follows: When your membership comes up for renewal, you will receive a credit equal to the number of days that we are closed in March. This will be calculated by dividing the annual subscription by 365 days and then multiplying it by the number of days we were closed from March 1st. 

This credit will then be placed on your account when you renew and will be used to reduce your monthly direct debits over the next 12 months.

To help us manage this process, it would be greatly appreciated if Members did not pay their subscription all in advance.

Thank you to everyone who has continued to support the Club, we are doing all we can to ensure you have a wonderful Club and course to come back to and one that continues to improve over the coming years.

Pro shop

Late last year we said that Get Golfing was developing an online replacement to the traditional, club-based pro shop to give Members access to a truly comprehensive range of golf equipment at very keen prices.

From early April, the Get Golfing Pro Shop will be open for business. As you will see from the spread of logos below, we have secured deals with a terrific range of suppliers.

 

Get Golfing shop brands

 

We will still sell the day-to-day consumables — such as balls, tees and gloves — on site but, in addition, we will now be able to offer you a wider range of products: from golf clubs, bags, shoes and clothing to lasers, logoed apparel and electric trolleys. 

Practically anything you can buy online will be available from our shop.  

The shop is connected to your Club Card, ensuring you receive the appropriate discounts in line with your membership, which are as follows:

GetGolfing Membership Discounts

The prices shown on the website for each item include your relevant discount. Practically all products offered receive a discount but there are some items where margins are so tight that we may not be able to give the full discount. Do not despair, however, as we are also committed to offering a price-match guarantee — so if the product is not shown or is shown at a price higher than you have seen elsewhere, call us and we will do our best to match or better it.

One of the significant benefits, apart from pricing, of our website is that we do not charge shipping on any product. Orders received by midnight on a Sunday will be at the Club ready for collection by the following Thursday. 

All items purchased are paid for through your Club Card, so all you have to do is make sure you have sufficient credit on your card via our simple online top-up facility (which can be done at the time of purchase).    

As we know, your Club has had a challenging time with Covid and lockdowns, so please try to support us by using this service and we will use the profits from your purchases to invest in the Club.

Courses news

From Dave Taylor, Courses Manager: As some of you may or may not be aware, from January 5th, myself and all other members of staff at The Bristol were placed on furlough and have not been on site in our normal capacity. However, and I know this will be unpopular with the majority of you, but there was probably no better time than January, February and early March to have the courses closed. 

These are historically our wettest months and the hardest in which to manage the courses. Having had no play on any of the surfaces will really make a big difference to the standard of the course upon your return on March 29th. 

Although we were all on furlough, I visited the Club once or twice a week to keep an eye on the place. If it is any comfort, through January we had more than 111mm of rain and, at the time of writing in February, we had had another 63mm over the site.

January, particularly, saw huge downpours of rain in very short spaces of time, which would have led to the course being closed on safety and poor ground condition concerns. So, like I say, this really hasn’t been the worst time to have the courses closed. 

As far as course work is concerned, early in January, I took the opportunity to aerate the greens and give them an iron nutrient-based fertiliser to help carry them through the coming months. The iron content is predominantly to help harden up the grass sward against the onset of turf disease and discourage the development of moss. 

Since then the greens have been left to their own devices and, again in my opinion, they are looking the best for this time of year since I joined the club. So far, I have seen very little leather jacket damage or occurrence on the greens. Going back 12 months and we had already lost a great amount of turf coverage and the quality of playing surfaces by this point, so this really does put us in a great position for the spring. 

Historically problematic greens, 12 and 13 are looking brilliant with much lower occurrences of disease scarring and greater healthiness of the plant. They have only been cut once since lockdown and that only took place in mid-February. I am very confident that upon the return to golf the greens are going to be in great shape and it will be very quick to get them up to the high standards we aim for. 

The biggest difference on your return, however, will be to the area to the right of the 15th fairway and left-hand side of 17th tee. Since lockdown began, it was the very next day that Wessex water began their temporary site construction work for the new Bristol sewer relief pipework. 

I have attached a PR flyer that myself and Wessex water have put together for all Members and visitors to the club to explain fully the works going on onsite and what the overall scheme of work will entail. 

Again this has been another huge benefit of the lockdown, that they have been able to carry out the work uninterrupted without golf being played around the site and has ultimately led them to be ahead of schedule for their works already. 

Staff news

Get Golfing Apprenticeships: Despite the day-to-day challenges thrown up by Covid and the lockdowns over the past 12 months, you may be interested to learn that Get Golfing has been working to put together a personal development programme for staff. 

This includes engaging with the government’s Kickstart programme to help individuals aged between 18 and 25 to get a foot on the career ladder. 

We will be looking to hire between three to five staff on a six-month contract through this programme to help us on the course and in the clubhouse. 

The goal is to help some of these individuals find long-term jobs and careers within the golf and food and beverage industry and to that end we will also be introducing apprenticeships towards the end of the year. Hopefully some of the Kickstart candidates from earlier in the year will progress onto these apprenticeships.

Get Golfing Internships: Finally, the condition of our golf courses is paramount to benchmarking Get Golfing’s progress and critical to our delivery of that goal is the motivation, education and professionalism of our green staff. 

To encourage their career development, we have launched an internship programme with Pelican’s Nest Golf Club, near Tampa in Florida. Four staff from across our group will benefit from a three-month training and life experience programme with the highly experienced management of this 36-hole, Fazio-designed private Members’ club. Get Golfing will pay all their travel, accommodation and wages during their internship. Applications from staff will be assessed during the third quarter of this year and we will let you know who the lucky beneficiaries are in due course.

Win a Golfbreaks.com break!

Get Golfing partner Golfbreaks.com has teamed up with Mizuno Pairs Tour to provide the chance to win some truly unbelievable prizes when you enter a Golfbreaks UK Pairs Tour event or the Golfbreaks Match Play this summer. 

European Tour, Solheim Cup, Open Qualifier and PGA venues across the UK feature in the schedule at great value prices. 

You and your playing partner are guaranteed a very warm welcome from the Golfbreaks team, a fun day out on the fairways and the opportunity to win a trip at one of the world’s finest golf destinations should you finish top of the leaderboard!

Every winning prize destination across the schedule is of the highest quality. Trips to Dubai, Dominican Republic, Portugal, France & Spain are all up for grabs with PGA TOUR, European Tour and Ryder Cup host courses part of the experience. Golfbreaks says it has gone all out with more than £30,000 worth of prizes to play for across the year and the top five pairs at every event taking home a prize!

Take your pick at Golf Breaks’ great value events below and enter here:

Pro news

Putting something together over the weekend