Our sixth and LAST regular season TOB event – the September 2024 Tour of the Brookfields Tournament was held on Sunday, September 8th at Quail Hollow Golf and Country Club in Oakham, MA. It was sponsored by Lamoureux Ford in East Brookfield.

We sincerely thank Lamoureux Ford for their longtime sponsorship of this event and the Tour of the Brookfields!

There was a nip in the air and it seemed as if Fall was knocking on summer’s door. I arrived with Lynn before 7 AM and discovered a baby snapping turtle on the cart path by the cart shed below the clubhouse. I saw Debbie Donlin and let her know of my discovery as I thought it was cool. The little cold-blooded guy or gal (I did not investigate) was struggling with the cold (around 52 degrees Fahrenheit) to cross and make his way to safety.

Debbie exclaimed, “Oh my God, they hatched!”, and sure enough there was a small conga line of little snappers trying to make their way to the distant (for them) pond by the 18th hole green. Their eggs were laid on a hill earlier this year by a bog momma snapper.

I spotted the little reptiles for her and she scooped them up with an old golf ball box and got them to the pond/grass edge safely. I think she got between 12-15 of them to cover. If they had come out the day before or even an hour later I think the golf carts would have done them in – so it was an auspicious start to a golf day!

I thought I’d share as not many of you got to catch this little miracle of nature!

Back to the golf! Despite the initial cold, it did warm up and we had great golf weather. There were 96 golfers on 24 teams divided into three divisions/flights. The three were competitive as you will see, and we did have one very exciting playoff. There were just two skins won as well.

In the Nicklaus Flight, the team of Chris Depasse, Clayton Rice, Tim Nason, Sr., and Alex Morales  came in first place with a great score of -11. This was the lowest score by any team in the tournament. Congratulations to all for a fine round of golf! Coming in second place only one stroke back at -10 was the team of Cory Heyes, Tom McCarthy, Rick Gendreau, and Jamie McShera. Very well done!

In the Player Flight, the winning team won by the largest stroke difference between first and second place that we had all year – 3 strokes! Coming out on top was the team of Tom Orszulak, Brad Earle, Brian Chaffee, and Spencer Rice.  Amazing! Coming in second and taking that honor due to better match on the 15th hole was the team of Ryan Auger, Tom Foley, Dan Foley, and Brandy Peterson. Congrats to all!

Lastly, in the Palmer Flight, we had a very tight group of teams. Two of them ended up playing off in sudden death over three holes as both top flight teams came in at 8 under par. Outlasting the competition in the playoff was the team of Beth McCann, Dave Woodward, Nelson Malin, and Jason Malin. Dave Woodward, in very dramatic fashion – and with the gallery watching – made the winning putt as the last player on the last playoff hole. Wow!! with Woody’s great putt, Beth’s team narrowly outlasted the team of John Snelling, Adam Stati, Kathy Keough, and Nick Snelling. John’s team are to be congratulated as well on a tough performance – to include precariously standing on the wall over the pond on one shot (giving the baby snappers a nice view perhaps?). Amazing golf was played by these two teams!

Two skins were won – an Eagle on the par-4 second hole by the winners of the Player Flight, Beth McCann, Dave Woodward, Nelson Malin, and Jason Malin! A birdie on the par-4 fifteenth hole netted the other skin for the team of Jack Dorman, Ken Burnham, Kristen Depasse, and Greg Wypych. Congrats!

For the closest to the pin prize on 17, that went to Rich Casault for his team with a fine shot – a 2′ 1″ laser.

The results table is below, as are some notes for the upcoming and highly-anticipated FINALS! I’ll also share a few photos

2024 Lamoureux Ford Open Results

The Next Tournament IS THE FINALS!!

Thanks again to all the players, to Lamoureux Ford for sponsoring this event, and to Gary and Debbie Donlin, Jim LeBlanc, and all the staff at Quail Hollow who work so hard to make the Tour of the Brookfields possible.

The next tournament is the FINALS and it will be HUGE!.

Key information for the FINALS – Mark your calendars!

The FINALS will be on Saturday September 28th with registration starting at 8:30 AM as daylight and cold will be approaching.

This blog will have KEY INFORMATION about the FINALS. I will publish all of the results for this year’s events in a consolidated and downloadable list in this blog (“Life, Golf, Miniatures, & Other Distractions”) similar to what I did last year.

As soon as the committee decides the ranking of the A-players for the draft and the field choices, I will also include that information in the same post. I expect to put that out by the evening of September 22nd or early on the 23rd. The committee’s decision on A-men rankings and the publication of the players in the field will occur by September 23rd – also here in this blog.

Due diligence on the A-players’ parts will be an important aspect in preparing for the draft night. All will have access to the same information published here.

The FINALS sign up will close no later than September 15th – and possibly even closed up earlier. We will be looking for subs volunteers through the Facebook group Facebook page for the TOB here.

The DRAFT NIGHT for the FINALS will be held at Quail Hollow on September 26th (Thursday) evening at 7 PM. ALL are invited and encouraged to attend.

If you have any feedback or comments on this blog post – there is a comment section that you can use below. I will continue to put up these events on Facebook – with results posted here on this blog.

Once again, this blog is titled, “Life, Golf, Miniatures, and Other Distractions”. I do post other stuff here – mainly around miniature toy soldiers and tabletop wargaming (my other passions). Feel free to subscribe as an email follower! (and it is free and you’ll get instant updates).

A consolidated list of 2024 Golf Posts is here.

Lastly, I promised some photos…

Stay tuned, the FINALS ARE COMING VERY SHORTLY!