News

On Friday Berkhamsted played Kings Langley in the Dacorum Charity Shield. Although they have already won this Competition this season Berkhamsted beat them 4 Games to 1. The Ladies team of Carol Dunn, Dagmar McKay, Kay Lingwood and Jackie Cormack won 27-22; The Men’s team of Bob Anderson, Bill Howells, Trefor Jenkins and Tony Howard won 35-13 (and were Top Rink) and the mixed team of Liz Baker, Sylvia Smith, Brian Ralphs and David Brown lost 15-22. However, Berkhamsted won overall by 77 shots to 57 shots. Two Friendly games were also played and these teams were; Marion Maynard, Stuart Wesley, Steve Shearing and Ken Maynard who drew 20-20 and Eric Lloyd, Gill Howells, Alan Baker and Maurice Primo who unfortunately lost 18-22.

On Saturday a friendly match was played against Berkhamsted’s old rivals Kitcheners, from just down the road and Berkhamsted managed to win a game played on a lovely warm day by 82 shots to 69. The top team for Berkhamsted was Noreen Codina, Brian Smith, Sylvia Smith and Dave Sear.

Berkhamsted Bowls Club held its Finals this weekend starting on Friday evening with the Semi-Finals of the Mixed Triples to determine the Finalists for Sunday Afternoon. There were 8 finals on Saturday and another 8 on Sunday and we were blessed with fine, if cool at times, weather. We were treated to some fine bowling and some close matches on an excellently prepared green. Sarah Marshall, our blind bowler won her first club championship and then went on to win two more (aided by her directors; Liz Temple & Linda Ralphs).

The highlights included: The Men’s Singles between Kevin Clarke and Jack Bunting, The 2-Wood Men’s Singles between David Brown & Jack Bunting; The Highland Trophy Singles – where Tony Howard narrowly beat Brian Ralphs; The U19 Singles Final was a very high class match between the Bunting brothers with Jack beating younger brother Toby by 3 shots and lastly the Fours was decided with a last end winning shot – doesn’t come much closer than that!

The Results were as follows…..

Ladies Singles: Winner: Kay Lingwood; R/Up: Jackie Cormack;

Men’s Singles Winner Kevin Clarke; R/Up: Jack Bunting;

Ladies 2-Wood Singles: Winner: Sarah Marshall; R/Up: Jackie Cormack;

Men’s 2-Wood Singles: Winner: David Brown; R/Up: Jack Bunting;

Highland Trophy Singles: Winner: Tony Howard; R/Up: Brian Ralphs; Handicap Singles: Winner: Kevin Clarke; R/Up: Bob Anderson;

Veterans Singles: Winner: Tony Howard; R/Up: David Sear;

Novice Singles: Winner: Linda Ralphs; R/Up: Eric Lloyd;

Newcomers Singles: Winner: John Bell; R/Up: Toby Bunting;

U19 Singles: Winner: Jack Bunting; R/Up: Toby Bunting;

Ladies Pairs: Winners: Kay Lingwood & Sarah Marshall; R/Up: Anne Furlong & Jackie Cormack;

Men’s Pairs: Winners: David Brown & Bob Anderson; R/Up: Terry Kenyon & John Webb;

Mixed Pairs: Winners: Jack Bunting & Sarah Marshall; R/Up: Anne Furlong & Tony Howard;

Pedlow Trophy (Australian Pairs): Winners: Toby Bunting & Luke Swan; R/Up: Frank Cutting & Jackie Cormack;

Mixed Triples: Winners: Peter Rowling, Jenny Carr & Bob Anderson; R/Up: Tom Presland, Tim Bailey & Noreen Codina;

Mixed Fours: Winners: Liz Temple, Paul Shorne, Stephen Shearing; Gill Howells; R/Up: Steve Burrell, Lynn Kessler, Geoff Drew & Anne Cutting.

Finally a big thank you to all who helped make the weekend a resounding success – we love it when a plan comes together!

BERKHAMSTED WIN SIX WATFORD & DISTRICT MENS FINALS !

In a friendly played away at Chalfont St Giles Berkhamsted were well walloped, losing by 101 shots to 65, only managing to win on one rink, but with some very close scores on others. Top rink was Carole Syms, Dagmar McKay and Brian Ralphs.

However Berkhamsted enjoyed its most successful year ever with wins in five singles competitions along with the Pairs title. Top performers for the Club were Kevin Clarke and Jack Bunting winning three titles each. Clarke won the Mens Singles, Champion of Champions Singles & Past Presidents Singles whilst Jack Bunting picked up the U25 & U18 Singles & Pairs title. Once again Berkhamsted hosted the finals day and want to thank all the members who created an impressive staging as well as organising a well-run day.

The FINALS results:

Mens Singles: Kevin Clarke 21 Vinny Payne 10; Champion of Champions: Kevin Clarke 21 John Wheatley 14; U25 Singles: Jack Bunting 21 Glenn Williams 8; U18 Singles: Jack Bunting 21 Toby Bunting 8; Officers Singles: Dave Richardson 21 Simon Johnson 3; Past Presidents: Kevin Clarke 21 David Neilson 10; Pairs: J Bunting & T Howard 16 V Payne & G Edwards 13; Fours: Bovingdon (Johnson) 13 Herts (Parker) 12; 2 Wood Triples: Garston (Coles) 17 Bushey (Sage) 15; Australian Pairs: Edwards & Element 23 Jenkins & Howard 8.

To finish the week Sunday’s match against Aylesbury was a pleasant enjoyable game equally poised throughout the afternoon. Of the four triples played each side won two and with only one shot distinguishing the winners, Berkhamsted, 67 shots to 66. The teams were: M Maynard P Burke A Jones – lost 14/18; N Codina F Cutting L Temple – won 14/12; M Young A Cutting K Maynard – lost 14/21; M Primo J Healy J Cheshire-Burke – who won 25/15 and were top rink.

This week saw a jubilant victory for the ladies of Berkhamsted when they won the Watford & District Jubilee Cup against a team from Herts Club. The game consisted of two rinks of triples playing for an overall shots victory and the match went down to the wire – with one rink of Berkhamsted finishing 5 shots down the other rink was 4 shots up with one end to play on a difficult rink. The team put all their effort into their shots winning the end by 3 and so the match finished with Berkhamsted 2 shots up. The teams consisted of Sarah Marshall, Kay Lingwood, Liz Temple, Carole Dunn, Anne Furlong, Jackie Cormack, Lesley Brown, Linda Ralphs and Janet Jackson.

In the only friendly game this week and in the glorious sunshine Berkhamsted beat Princess Risborough by 122 shots to 103 winning 4 rinks to 2. Berkhamsted’s top rink was Jill Griffin, Geoff Drew and skip David Sear who won by 34 to 11.

A good week all round for Berkhamsted.

The Ladies had a good win with Carole Dunn, Anne Furlong and Jackie Cormack winning through to the Watford & District semi-finals in the 2 wood triples defeating a trio from Bushey 23 – 8.

However the same Trio had mixed fortunes over the weekend with Carole Dunn, Anne Furlong and Jackie Cormack attempting to reach the Watford & District finals in the Triples and 2 wood Triples. On Friday in pouring rain they beat Radlett by 17 – 11 shots in the Triples, however on the Saturday they lost in the 2 wood triples to Bushey, they had a 3 end poor start but the rest of the match was very evenly balanced.

Things did not go so well for Berkhamsted in the Dacorum Community Shield match against Tring last Monday 12th June with the following results.

Ladies: Tring 28 Berkhamsted 12; Men: Tring 26 Berkhamsted 17; Mixed: Tring 28 Berkhamsted 15. In addition to this there was a friendly match which also lost 12-39. The total result was in Points: Tring 5 Berkhamsted 0.

At the beginning of last week, on Sunday, was the Club Fours in which 32 players competed in 8 randomly selected teams to secure a place in this year’s Finals in September. Given the monsoon conditions we had at the end of the previous week the players tolerated the protection mats needed to avoid serious damage to the green and served up some excellent bowling in a competitive but friendly spirit. The two successful teams were Team CAT (Liz Temple, Paul Shorne, Stephen Shearing, Gill Howells) and Team THRUSH (Steve Burrell, Lynn Kessler, Geoff Drew, Anne Cutting) – so will the Cat get the Bird in this year’s final?!

On last Sunday this year’s Mixed Triples Competition was played and has proved very popular with 54 players wanting to play in it. To accommodate this number we have had to arrange matches on two separate days, with 12 teams playing yesterday (Sunday) and 6 teams playing this coming Wednesday, in order to find the 4 teams that will play semi-finals on the Friday evening of our Finals weekend in September. Though the early rain threatened to mar the day, it cleared just as play started to allow the day’s play to be in good sunshine. As always play was highly competitive and friendly with some close ‘9-end’ matches resulting. After 3 matches each Team Labrador (Kevin Clarke, Janet Jackson, Christine Sims), Team Jay (Peter Rowling, Jenny Carr, Bob Anderson) and Team Raven (Phil Bunting, Paul Shorne, Kay Lingwood) were Group winners and they now wait to see from Wednesday’s matches who will join them in the semi-finals.