Our lucky competition winner played in a Sky Sports golf team at Celtic Manor's Fairway to Furlong event.
Competition winner enjoys successful day out at Celtic Manor
Celtic Manor witnessed a remarkable Ryder Cup victory for Europe last October, and on the eve of the 2011 Cheltenham Festival the venue saw similar celebrations as our very own
Sky Sports golf team claimed glory in the Fairway to Furlong competition.
The Cheltenham Festival Centenary Golf Day was the latest event organised by FairwaytoFurlong.com (part of Yourgolftravel.com) and benefiting both Cancer Research UK and Help For Heroes.
One lucky
skysports.com reader won the opportunity to take part in the event, which included 18 holes on the Roman Road course, a night in the luxurious Celtic Manor hotel as well as a gala dinner and charity auction.
Our man, Ian Baker, maybe should have had a 'Finch' attached to his name after a superb performance which not only fired the
Sky Sports team to victory on the course but also netted him second place in the individual standings.
Packages were available for all three courses at Celtic Manor, with the Montgomerie Course and of course very same 2010 track that staged the Ryder Cup last year.
Long road
After a long trip down from
Sky Sports towers in Leeds, and a noisy overnight stay in a Welsh motel - yes motel, not hotel - nearby, arrival at Celtic Manor on a crisp frosty March morning got the golfing juices flowing immediately.
Albeit not quite with the prestige the 2010 now possesses, the Roman Road is still a more than decent 18 holes with some testing holes given the cold and breezy conditions - and given the hilly nature of the course then you should expect some breeze at most times.
Also expect the greens to be quick! Despite having the lock of greens just emerging from the winter, and with there being quite a bit of mud on the course, they were still slippery to say the least, with only a couple on the slower side.
Buggies being provided helped, and a nice added feature was the V-Par live scoring system. This was a handheld computer which you simply enter every player's score and it automatically allocates your stableford points and produces a live leaderboard for the entire field.
This feature meant that as we made our way around the course we noticed our team topping the standings - and although a bad spell saw us slip down the rankings, one final push saw us home.
Not led by myself, I must add, after a pretty poor performance, but David Keywood and Joe 'Boom Boom' Buckley kept things ticking along nicely while our competition winner Ian Baker definitely stole the show with his efforts.
With V-Par telling us we had a slender lead at our final hole, luckily it was a par three and we did just enough to hold our nerve and bring home the bacon for
Sky Sports by just a single point!
Winners
A quick, but by no means cheap, couple of pints in the beautiful Lodge clubhouse and it was on to the Celtic Manor hotel, which was amazingly luxurious and could not have been more of a change to our previous night's lodgings - this was obviously a hotel built for winners.
Back to the Lodge for some welcome fizz before a scrumptious three-course meal, live music, plenty of golf and Cheltenham chat before a charity auction hosted by Derek Thompson - who also handed over our prizes for good measure.
A special mention has to go to the lads at European Golf Design, not only for providing some informative chat about golf courses but also for having to go early and leaving us with their share of wine and desserts! Double pudding is definitely for winners.
This was not so great the day after, with our celebrations maybe going on a bit too long, but not enough damage was done to prevent us taking in Celtic Manor's brilliant breakfast, including the biggest sausages ever seen on a plate!
Our man Ian sadly could not take up the second part of his prize, which was a ticket for the races at Cheltenham, but judging by his slightly tender condition that may not have been an entirely bad thing.
All-in-all, though, a hugely entertaining and satisfying day out, with fantastic facilities, top-notch company and mouth-watering catering - there was even some half-decent golf to go along.
The majority of the contingent then went off to Cheltenham to do battle with the bookies, as part of the package offered by Yourgolftravel.com, and speaking now from experience these are well worth a look at.
Obviously, if you're a regular on
skysports.com you may just get the chance to win a trip for free, and if you're even luckier you'll be landed with three expert team-mates to ensure you also walk off with the trophy!
Perhaps the only sad note was arriving back in Leeds to discover our celebrations had meant us leaving our golf shoes behind at Celtic Manor - if anyone from the venue is reading then get in touch!
Thanks to Sam Krume and Charlie Hacking for being on hand all through the day and night to look after all of us on the trip
For more golf trips and special packages go to www.yourgolftravel.com, or view more of the special golf/racing events coming up this year and book your place at Fairwaytofurlong.com.
