Micah Dorius won his 13th course championship in the last 14 years with a very impressive -34 for 3 and a half rounds. Micah shot a -12 on the first course a -3 on the long rain soaked second course and a -13 on the short final course. The final nine saw some drama as the top 3 finishers automatically make the San Diego team for the upcoming team tourney. 2009 course champion Chris Villmorin (-23 4th place) made a run at Luke Christensen(-24,3rd) in the final 9 tying him with three holes to go only to have his putt on the final hole catch a tree blocking his route to the pin. After shooting a tourney low -14 in the 3rd round Chris had to settle for 4thplace. Chris will be first seed in the match play grinder set for next Saturday November 19th at 9 a.m. at Morley Field. Carlo Pelg (-29) finished 2nd as he has nearly every year since Micah began his run as course king.
The amateur category saw a very talented young north county man Nick Newton (James) (-13) shoot 3 very solid under par rounds to win by a comfortable margin of 3 strokes over local Mike Tyberg(-10) who was the only other am to shoot under par each round. Mike also had the only hole in one in the tourney. He aced hole 13 in the long position in round 2.
The conditions on Saturday started off poor and got worse from there. The rain was torrential and unrelenting for the entire second round. This was the long private course that only competitors in the course championships ever get to see and play. Some groups were still straggling in at 4 p.m. having teed off at noon. Of the 21 open and 43 amateurs who started the event 10 were unable to complete the event for whatever reason. But Jesse Myers who understandably finished DFL played the entire 3 rounds on crutches. He often knelt down in the water for tee offs. He was given a hat and shammy towel as an “Ironman” award for his efforts.
We had 5 women play this year and Emily Costanza (formerly Hardy) was the winner (+9) . Emily shot a very respectable -4 in the 3rd round. Second place went to up and coming Amber Ivy(+32) who fought her way back to second having fallen to 4th after the long second round in the rain. Amber also had marvelous third round shooting a +1.
I’d like to thank my great staff of Jim McDowell, Eric and EJ Simmons and all the guys in the shop who helped out. Big George created beautiful hand carved trophies for The Am’s and Open. Will Phillips helped with the certificates for the Women, Open Masters (Jeff Nichols -10), and Open Grandmasters (Glenn Triemstra -2).