It never rains it pours goes the old saying and the virtual drought we have been having has now well and truly broken with flooding rains forecast across the week end and in to next week.  Unfortunately the first two rounds of the Club Championships were due to be played and have been abandoned for this week end and will now be played as a 54 hole event over the next three Saturdays.  The call was made on this after the forecast was assessed and options discussed at a special meeting of the Match Committee on Thursday afternoon in anticipation of the inclement weather.  After the fears of large rainfall figures were realised with torrential rain falling on Friday and the forecast of similar conditions prevailing on Saturday,  the decision that had been discussed at the meeting was implemented.

Perhaps the main reason for the call to made is that the West greens are in a condition that they can not take very much rainfall before water pooling commences rendering them virtually unplayable as relief from casual water can't always be found.  The reason for the water pooling is that the greens are such a tight surface at the moment which is one of the reasons for renovation where the soil pores are opened up and water can move through the profile more easily.

Unfortunately the greens renovation was due to take place next Monday and as predominantly dry conditions are required to allow the soil amendments and fertiliser to be applied, not to mention the extraction of the soil cores as part of the coring process which is very difficult on wet greens.  At this stage the renovations will be put back a week to Monday September 1st with that days Members competition being moved to the River course to allow for the works to proceed.

UPDATE:
 55mm had fallen on the courses to 5.00am on Saturday morning and whilst motorised buggies are off both courses which drastically cuts player numbers, the good news is that it has been very good soaking rain which is what the courses desperately needed.  Saturday mornings total takes us up to just shy of 160mm for the week with more to come.  Interesting that one forecast I saw predicts showers on Friday, Saturday and Sunday but "rain" on Monday so batten down the hatches perhaps!