Eighty veterans (described in my dictionary as ‘..a person or thing that has given long service in some capacity’. I think I can live with that!) played in the seniors stableford at East Devon on Monday, writes Paul Willoughby.

No rain, but it was really cold; a strong south easterly wind plagued us throughout the day and was right in our faces on the second, ninth, 16th and 17th holes.

Most of us will have thought of (and a lot of us will actually have used the words) ‘brass monkeys’. The story goes that cannonballs used to be stored aboard ship in piles, on a brass frame or tray called a ‘monkey’.

In very cold weather the brass would contract, spilling the cannonballs: hence very cold weather is ‘cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey’. That’s probably a load of rubbish but it’s a nice idea.

However the course was playing well; lack of rain has given us some run on the ball and the greens, although recently dressed and fertilised, are fast and true (sounds like a lawyer!) so credit to Paul Newcombe and his team.

They’re doing a grand job and hopefully by the summer and with some good weather conditions the area around the 13th and 14th will be in sparkling form. That’s the wrong adjective but I can’t think of another right now!

There were some excellent scores and the winner who had clearly given some ‘….long service in some capacity….’ was George Lumsden with a superb 41 points. Well done, George.

The leading scores were as follows: 1, George Lumsden, 41 points, handicap 16, now cut to 14 (and I should think so too!); 2, John Threlfall, 37 points (13 cut to 12); 3, Andy Scott, 37 points (10); 4, Bill Norris, 36 points (6, now 5); 5, Mike Knapton, 35 points (20); 6, Bob Lankester, also 35 (11).

There was a two’s pot of £77, shared between eight players.