2014 Tournament Report

For 26 years, the Peter Alliss Masters golf tournament was staged at the Golf House Club Elie in the Kingdom of Fife. However 2014 saw a fundamental change as the event moved to the Old Thorns Manor Hotel Golf and Country Estate in Liphook Hampshire.

Quite a few participants played a practice round on the Tuesday but proceedings proper got under way that evening with a reception followed by dinner at which Monique Kalkman, two times Paralympic champion (at table tennis then lawn tennis) gave an eloquent and moving talk about her sporting life. This was the second time Monique had been with us, the first being at our 2012 event.

Keith O’Keefe, a renowned comedian and after dinner speaker, then entertained the assembled guests.

The move south enabled quite a few participants to join the golf event just for the day of the tournament, including Bob Anderson, former darts world champion, Chris Villiers, well known actor and Tiff Needell, former racing driver
and erstwhile presenter of Top Gear. In all they swelled the numbers to 72 players from 30 clubs.

Unlike previous Peter Alliss Masters, play got underway with a shotgun start at 11:00am. Historically Peter has always seen participants tee off the first but instead he met everyone for the traditional photograph as they came through either the 9th or 18th greens. The event was played in glorious autumn weather. The course, designed by Peter and the late Dave Thomas, offered a stiff challenge.

TOURNAMENT RESULT

Ladies
1st	Penny Ainsworth	Helsby GC	33 pts
2nd	Liz Jennings	Tytherington GC	33 pts
Men
1st	Derek Silk	Ferndown GC	36 pts
2nd	Bob Anderson & Derry Hanratty	Moseley GC	35 pts
4th	Steve Cunniffe	Tytherington GC	33 pts

There are plenty of photos taken by David Burlison of for you to look through and remember your time at the event if you click here.

The shotgun start meant all participants finished at about the same time and enabled everyone to attend the powered wheelchair presentation at 5:00pm. The fine weather enabled this to take place outside and as ever it was the highlight of the day with seven children receiving chairs (details below). The evening saw the usual presentation when the worthy winners received their prizes, with Derek receiving his Green Jacket along with the traditional Quaich (Scottish drinking Cup) that he will keep for a year.

After dinner Keith O’Keefe, took on the role of auctioneer to sell off a host of items that people had generously donated – this along with the perennial £20 sweep raised over £6,000. Additional income from sponsorship – see ‘Our Supporters‘ – the sale of places in the event, the challenge on the 10th hole, and the sale of merchandise plus a number of kind donations meant that the charity’s coffers were swelled to a tune of just short of £10,000. All of this will go to the provision of yet more powered wheelchairs.

The charity committee believes the move to Old Thorns has been a resounding success with so many more people from the south able to participate. It is firmly believed that the event, and through that the Charity, will go from strength to strength as we seek to build on this move to a new “home “ for the Peter Alliss Masters.