As most of you are aware by now January saw Thinus depart as GM and as of the 22nd January I placed myself in the hot seat - and what a few first weeks it has been ! 
The first few days Thinus did a well-prepared hand over that was truly a baptism of fire – however, after that its been time to sit individually with all staff members that, and for good reason, were mostly apprehensive of what the future for them held with a new GM – I’m hoping this process put most of those fears aside.
It’s now time for me to spend a week or two getting to grips with our systems, prioritising current issue and finding long term solutions for our club. As I come from the side of a long-term member of the club and having served on the Governing Body, I am aware of the issues that I and the team face going forward – I am off course reminded of all of these and more on the patio by many of the members 😊
With regards our greatest asset, the golf course, we face an ongoing situation of water, or more accurately, the lack thereof. Although all rounds have a water levy imposed, it is still insufficient due to the strange situation of a lack of rain at Kyalami Country Club. All around us golf courses have had a record January when it comes to rainfall and yet we experienced one of the worse with a total of 50mm – I’m sure Etienne will elaborate on this.
The upside to this is after doing our hollowtining and interceding we did have some rain and our greens have come along in leaps and bounds. Kyle will elaborate on the two tournaments that we hosted in January that both went off incredibly well with many compliments for our course.
Short and sweet from my side for January and all that I need to add is to thank Thinus for the dedication and effort he put in during his time with us and wish him and his family well with their relocation to Vietnam.
And please remember – “When accepting golfing tips from friends, amateurs teach amateurs to play like amateurs 😊 (Helen Ashwill) “

It is with great pleasure to welcome 8 new ladies to our club.  Unathi Klassie, Gill Isley, Michelle Mallon, Di Gauld, Monique de Plessis, Chere Myburg, Loren van den Borre and Sandra Duve. 
Sadly we have lost three members Ashely Bester, Kim Remington and Yvette Maine, we wish you all well at your new clubs.
Our Club Champs will be held on the 26 and 27 March 2024.
And our Ladies Annual Golf Tour will be at Zebula from 3-6 October 2024.

Hello to all and welcome back to those that have returned from there annual festive break. We had an early start to the season with Hollowtining being done on the 3rd of January. The Hollowtining was done without any holdups and all went well. The greens have come back well and will be good for club champs which is just around the corner.
We have not been as fortunate as the surrounding areas when it comes to rainfall and in comparison, over the last 3 years our rainfall is disappointing, the table below are our rain figures.
The lack of rain is quite evident when it comes to the condition of the course and surrounding areas

What an absolute blur of a start to 2024. Ettiene and his staff did an incredible job to get the hollow tining done in 2 days and despite earning the nickname Dryalami in January the course has recovered incredibly well. Just to give some perspective we had 50mm of rain in January – about a third of what the next driest course in the area had and 1/6th of what Houghton had!
Despite the challenges we were privileged to host the CGGU Senior Strokeplay Open at the end of January and some of the best 50+ amateur golfers in the province, and a few from KZN, descended on Kyalami for 36 holes of strokeplay. Eddie Antonie put together 2 fantastic rounds of 68 and 70, despite a triple on the 8th in round 2, which earned him the title of both Senior Strokeplay Champion and CGGU Closed Champion. We had a number of members play in the event and in his first tournament Stuart Elliot was our best finisher on +5 followed closely by Jock Wellington on +6.
We also hosted the next generation of South African starts in the Bushveld Tour event directly after the Senior Strokeplay and in 3 days of golf there was some incredible golf played. Dylan O’Leary led the tournament through the first 2 rounds with rounds of 65 and 68. In the final round the golf course bared it’s teeth and Dylan was forced to make an EAGLE on 18 to force a playoff with Werner Deyzel both of them finishing on -12. The playoff started on Hole 17 and Werner hit a beautiful tee shot to 12 foot whilst Dylan hit his tee sheet left and couldn’t get up and down from very close to the bricks on 17 dam, Werner then 2 putted for the win to lift the trophy for his second win on the trot.
Knockcout draws are available on Scorecapture and on the noticeboards, please take note of the cutoff dates for matches as no extensions will be granted.
Our first Major of the year loom large in February and the Founders Trophy on the 17th of February is the perfect tune up for Club Champs as the format is IPS.
Club Championships are due to be played on the 2nd and 3rd of March and entries will open this week via a dedicated mailer!