It looked like just another day at the office for Gary Wolstenholme as he won the Hampshire Hog at North Hants on Sunday.
The four-times Walker Cupper (Kilworth Springs) breezed round in a brace of 66s -10 under par-to win his second Hog and match the record of the great Michael Bonallack a generation ago.
He later revealed that an overheard prediction that the winner of the Selborne Salver would also win the Hog had concentrated his mind. "I just gritted my teeth and said to myself: 'We'll see about that'," he said.
It helped to be drawn with Saturday's champion, Graeme Clark (Doncaster), who soon found Wolstenholme had rediscovered the touch that had eluded him at Blackmoor, where the defending champion stumbled to 73-73.
His morning 66 was garnished with seven birdies, including four in a row to the turn. He also dropped three shots, but was well pleased. "The course was set up perfectly for me, with much more receptive greens and friendly pin placings than at Blackmoor."
Even so, he had to give best at lunch to 17-year-old Jamie Moul (Stoke by Nayland), whose wonderful 65 would have been an amateur record had winter rules not still been in force.
Wolstenholme, whose handicap is a rarefied +5, Europe's lowest, reeled off seven pars after the break and then played his master stroke, outdriving his playing partners by 20 yards at the long 17th-his eighth hole-and then coaxing a four-iron through the swale and round the bunker to 12 feet. The eagle putt almost looked a formality.
The news that Moul, playing the front nine, had also shot 33 was all the incentive Wolstenholme needed. He birdied the 277-yard opener and added another at the new par-five third, where Keenan, third member of the trio, had a wonderful eagle after a three-wood over the lake to 15 feet.
The champion-elect misread the fifth green and three-putted, but hit back immediately with a three at the 367-yard sixth, holing from 10 feet.
He completely missed the green at the short eighth, but got up and down from thick grass to salvage his three. The birdie at the ninth, after a seven-iron to 18 feet, was the icing on the cake.
Meanwhile, Moul was suffering the torment of a double-bogey at the last, where he drove into sand and then three-pitted after running his pitch through the green.
The runner-up was twice consoled-first by the news that even a birdie would have made no difference to the outcome and then by hearing that he had won the Hampshire Salver, awarded for lowest aggregate of the weekend.
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