One of the nice guys is in Open running
Jul 3 2008 by Tim Taylor, The Journal
THE notion that nice guys come last went by the board at the Berwick club yesterday when George Cowan, a former Northumberland champion, moved to within one step of The Open Championship.
Cowan played Good Samaritan for caddie Stuart Harrison after shooting a three-under 69 over the Goswick Links.
After his early-morning round, the assistant at the Westerhope club drove Harrison back to Ponteland – as the caddie had to play for his club in the Hadrian League last night – knowing that if a play-off situation arose, he would have to drive all the way back to Goswick.
The top 11 yesterday went through to Local Final Qualifying in Lancashire next week with the championship itself starting at Royal Birkdale the week after that.
Cowan went through on the same score as two other North East golfers – Hugh MacDonald from South Moor and Morpeth’s former Northumberland Stroke Play champion David Clark.
With Bamburgh Castle youngster Garrick Porteous pulling out on the morning of the tournament with food poisoning, a 70 was enough to see Teesside’s Vince Guest and Seaton Carew’s James Harper through to next week right on the cut line.
Eaglescliffe’s Ryan Riley joins them on 68.
Already through are PGA Cup players Spike Nesbit (Westerhope) and Craig Goodfellow (Carlisle Driving Range) plus Stocksfield’s Chris Paisley, who qualifies straight through to the last stage of Open Qualifying because of his world amateur ranking.
Cowan, who shot four birdies and a bogey, said: “It took a me around 50 minutes to drive back.
“The only thing is if I had been involved in a play-off I would have had to drive back to Goswick again. But I stayed in touch with David Clark on my mobile – he went out at 7am in the group ahead of me – and I got the all clear from David late in the afternoon when the organisers knew there would be no play-off.”
The highlights of Cowan’s round were almost identical birdies at two of the par fives – the fourth and the sixth – where each time he was up against the face of a greenside bunker but splashed out to four feet to sink the putts for birdies.
Cowan and Clark had 4.30am alarm calls for their starts and Clark had reason to be grateful to his custom club fitter, Andrew Leach, the managing director of ZFL Golf.
Clark, a former Journal Champion of Champions, shot three birdies, no bogeys and hit 17 greens.
“It was the best I have played all season,” he said.
“Apart from the Richmond Pro-Am I have won nothing all year but Andrew Leach has just given the shaft in my driver a higher kick point.
“This kept the ball lower and that worked a treat on the fast running links course at Goswick.”
Clark went to work on a sausage sandwich yesterday morning – something MacDonald sees plenty of most days.
The 47-year-old MacDonald gave up his job making explosives for British Aerospace seven years ago and subsidised his new career as a regional golf professional running a café on Hobson Industrial Estate with his wife, Stephanie.
The former Scotland mid-amateur champion supplements that income by working in the club shop at South Moor and picking up prize money in pro-ams.
After five birdies and two bogeys he said: “It all seemed to come together today. I hit the ball well.”
Early starters Cowan, Clark and MacDonald all had the better of the conditions with the wind getting up in the afternoon. That made yesterday’s lowest score all the more commendable. Jack Doherty, Kilmarnock’s former Australian Amateur champion, shot a five-under 67 despite going out only four groups from the end.
Yesterday was also a triumph for Berwick, with higher-than-usual attendances as their potent mixture of experience and enthusiasm saw the day run relatively smoothly for a debut occasion.
They even found 30 volunteers from among their members for ball spotting duties on the course – three times the usual search party.
RESULTS: Page 73
