MONDAY 29 July saw the third round of the Seniors Cup played on the championship blues at Dartmouth Golf Club.

This medal competition takes the best three aggregate net scores over five rounds, with the prestigious board title on the line. Many are still well-placed in this marathon event but this third round gave the first indication of the likely eventual runners and riders.

Course handicap with the standard 95% allowance was in play and 32 golfers were in the mix on the day.

Wall to wall sunshine was the order of the day and with fast running fairways it was surprising that no one really took full advantage of the conditions.

That was except Messrs Philip Green (a relative newby) and Paul Stubbs who were the overall and Division 1 & 2 winners!

‘Super’ Mario Aresti carded the lowest round of the day with an 80, but a Nett 73 wasn’t good enough for him to feature in the winners’ table.

A solid performance from Brian Mushens has him leading the Seniors' Cup standings with Nett scores of 68, 72 & 74- all is still to play for with two rounds to go. All holes yielded a birdie or a par but there were some cricket scores recorded- those will go unmentioned.

Phillip Green finished top of the pops with a Nett 68, beating Paul Stubbs on countback. Nigel Osborne (71) completed the podium and was followed closely by Brian Mushens (72), Michael Whitelaw (72) and Richard Bevan (73).

Two birdie twos came courtesy of Paul Stubbs on the third and Mark Whitworth on the fifth.

Thanks, as always, go to the omnipresent Nigel Osborne who was in charge of the cards.

After these three rounds, Brian is out in front on Nett 214, whilst Mario (219) and Peter Hannaford (220) are his closest challengers. Round four will take place in early August.

Elsewhere, the Dartmouth Seniors returned to winning ways with a convincing 5.5 - 0.5 home victory over Staddon Heights. Conditions were dry with a light breeze, the course having benefited from recent rainfall. Four of the Dartmouth pairs had big wins with Gary Bonser & Steve Atkins’ 6&5 being the standout.

Gary Bonser secured the nearest the pin on hole five and earned a bottle of wine for his efforts.

Well done to all the players for a great result and lastly, to the latest results from the quarter finals of the Perring Cup pairs knockout.

Mario Aresti & Michael Whitelaw beat Alan Foot & Kevin Hoare plus Rob Barrett & John Oldrieve beat Peter Forde & Robert Wotton.