Page 56 - QDG Year of 2020

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1st The Queen’s Dragoon Guards
Golf
This year’s golfing season got off to a slow start due to the regiment’s deploy- ment on Exercise Wessex Storm but also began with some uncertainty due to the ongoing pandemic. Golf courses around the nation remained closed until May with play restricted meaning only two balls were permitted until the peak of summer. Nevertheless, there has been a consider- able number of individuals across all ranks taking up the sport. Most of the play has been restricted to social rounds due to many Army Golf Association events being cancelled. Despite this, QDG soldiers were out in droves around the many beautiful courses that Norfolk has to offer.
Outstanding feats were achieved, Cpl Lewis Mather being a novice of the sport shot his first hole in one, an amazing accomplishment for any golfer with odds of 12,500 to 1. WO2 Tom Hughes’s gym sessions resulted in him driving numerous par 4 greens from the tee and SSgt Kieran Taylor managed an eagle after finding the wrong fairway. Another novice with no such luck is Maj Paul Jones who was struck in the head by a member’s wild tee shot. Luckily no serious damage was done, he continued his round sporting a sock tucked under his cap as an improvised bandage. The Officers’ Mess creativity was shown by designing their own nine-hole golf course around
Robertson Barracks sports pitches. Complete with scorecards and hole layout
Cpl Greenwood organised the event resulting in a fantastic day enjoyed by all participating, he was rewarded for
his dedication by winning division 1. Division 2’s victor was Sgt Steven Panks who put a remarkable round together. Other winners were WO2 Hughes, Tpr Beth Parker and Pte Stephen Gibbons in the closest to the pin challenges. Capt Nath Rixson took great pride in accomplishing the longest drive of the day. Overall winners were HQ Squadron who narrowly pipped C SQN by a single point.
Looking ahead there are plans for a Ryder Cup style inter mess tournament as well as numerous regimental and Army Golf Association events forecast. Plans are in the early stages for a golf tour and having narrowly finished second in the last two RAC championships, the focus is to better that and bring the
title back to Robertson Barracks. The year ahead promises to be both chal- lenging and exciting for QDG golf.
KPT
courtesy of Google Maps. By Lt Ed Cooper remains the man to be beaten while Capt Jason ‘Butch’ Davies now has many of his clubs submerged in the numerous lakes and rivers around Wensum Valley.
all accounts
Lt Ed Cooper remains the man to be beaten while Capt Jason ‘Butch’ Davies now has many of his clubs submerged in the numerous lakes and rivers around Wensum Valley
SSgt Taylor and Sgt Dave Watson went on to repre- sent the regiment at the Eastern Region Army Golf Association championship held at Swaffham golf club.
Sgt Watson had success
in finishing runner up in division 2. He was narrowly beaten on count back, frustratingly not for the first time. Sgt ‘Sonic’ Davies,
Cpl Ash Greenwood, LCpls
Ian Owen and Stuart Finlay participated in Macmillan longest day golf challenge raising £435 for cancer support. Four rounds of golf back-to-back equating to 24 miles is a stern test for any golfer.
The culmination of this year’s season was the inaugural Luck Cup golf compe- tition held at Barnham Broom GC.
Basketball
This year has been a frustrating one for the Basketball team with their ability to train and play together as a team massively reduced. However, individuals’ commitment to the sport has meant that the Basketball team continues to thrive. The team has seen the departure of Tpr Old as Team Captain with LCpl Al-Ameri stepping up to lead the team.
The team started this year with high hopes of a tour taking us to Texas to test our skills against a collection of US Army teams. Once it became apparent that this was unlikely to go ahead, the team set their sights on a two-week training camp in Gibraltar. With excitement growing for this a new spate of restrictions saw all overseas travel banned and the trip was off.
With the QDG being one of the largest contributors to the RAC Basketball team with at least 4 players normally making the cut we decided that the next best thing would be to organise a two-week training camp during the weeks leading up to the RAC try outs in October. This would have seen us move down to Aldershot for a week to practise everything from individual skills such as dribbling and shooting to team formations and tactics. We would have then moved to Maindy Barracks in Cardiff for a week and played 3-4 friendly games against some civilian teams. The team was particularly looking forward to taking on some civilian teams and testing ourselves. Unfortunately, Covid-19 managed to thwart our attempts once again. Having cancelled the Alder- shot and Wales tour we set our sights on the RAC try outs
From the right NUMBER!
and while we could not practise as a team, individuals were training on their own in the build-up to this. Rather predict- ably the RAC try-outs was not to be and this saw the end of our year for the Basketball Team.
Throughout the year the team has remained optimistic and keen, with many individuals continuing to train their individual skills on the outdoor courts throughout the year despite myriad restrictions. Hopefully, 2021 will bring more opportunities to train and compete so that we can continue to improve the QDG Basketball team.
FLJH