AA Insurance Ladies Golf Championships

The 2009 National Finals of the AA Insurance Ladies Golf Championships recently took place at the Royal Tara Golf Club on September 23rd to 26th 2009. The Royal Tara Golf Club has been recognised for its superb golfing facilities in recent years. The championship comprised of seven teams with a wide range of handicaps from Athenry, Ballycastle, Castletroy, Douglas, Dublin City, Edenmore and Enniscorthy. Clubs compete within their District and the District Champions compete at National level with the overall winners receiving a Trophy and national green pennant. Six sets of inter club knock outs occurred in the diverse levels set out below. Edenmore showed outstanding performance on the day claiming a title for both junior foursomes and the intermediate cup.

Championship Finals

Senior Foursomes: handicap range + to 14 (individual) -Douglas
Junior Foursomes: handicap range 15 to 30 (individual) - Edenmore
Junior Cup: handicap range 8 to 15 (singles) - Dublin City
Intermediate Cup: handicap range 16 to 22 (singles) - Edenmore
Minor Cup: handicap range 23 to 29 (singles) - Blessington Lakes
Challenge Cup: handicap range 30 to 36 (singles) - Casteltroy

douglas

Douglas proudly took the title of Senior Foursomes this year over Ballycastle after narrowly losing last year’s final to Louth. Karen O’Neill and Deirdre O’Hanlan made an impressive start and were 4 up after 9 and went on to win 6 and 5. Eavan Higgins, previous Irish team captain and her partner Wendy Daly finished off the victory on the 15th to take the title Lee side.

The Intermediate cup and Junior Foursomes titles were both proudly claimed by Edenmore. Edenmore are a relatively young team with a mere 14 years in existence. The Intermediate club team which is aimed at mid range handicaps created club history in reaching their first All Ireland final against Galway. This was soon followed by the Junior Foursomes team against Curra West as Edenmore’s Zoe Allen and Cherry Logan who played on both teams demonstrated their skills and dedication playing 6 matches over 3 days and both winning 5 out of 6 matches.

douglas

The Challenge cup witnessed a tense final as Castletroy took the title over Mullingar with two matches a piece and the last match all square playing the par 5 eighteenth. It was a close finish as player Aisling Murphy was on the green in 4 with opponent Bernadette Solan on in 5. Mullingar put up a good fight with Teammates Carmel Monaghan and Hilary Shekelton securing two finals and striking revenge on Portumna in the quarter finals. Portumna had beaten Mullingar earlier this year in an All Ireland mixed final in Bandon. Castletroy proved too strong for Belvoir Park in the semi final with Aisling Murphy, Grace Leonard and Lauretta Hanrahan all winning by comfortable margins.

The Junior Cup final witnessed a significant achievement from Dublin City after only 8 years in existence and a mere 5 players to select from. Dublin defeated Mallow 4 – 1 in the final. Dublin City were knocked out of the Challenge cup by Mullingar in the semi final. Overall, it has been a successful year for Dublin City Golf Club.

Blessington lakes became crowned champions of the Minor Cup with a 4 ½ - ½ win against Rockmount Golf Club having defeated Athenry in the semi final. The team are no strangers to victory as previous winners of the 2006 Challenge cup.

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