A young Balmacewen team was the toast of the Otago Club after it won the senior A pennant title in gusty conditions on the Lower Waitaki course in Oamaru yesterday.
Otago beat Wanaka 5-1 in the morning and took the title 4.5-1.5 over North Otago in the afternoon.
On finals day, Thomas Facer, Hamish Ireland, Kayne Wardell and Tyrone Ratahi had two wins while team captain and No 1 Michael Smith emerged unbeaten with a win and a half.
Ratahi set the pace in the final, beating his father, Dion Loe-Ratahi, 8 and 6.
This put Otago in the driving seat as, in the event of a tie, the Otago players were likely to win on a countback of holes won.
This was even more significant when Wardell also finished early, beating Gary Creedy 4 and 3.
Otago needed one more win which came from Ireland who won the final hole when Michael Ormandy drove left and then was forced to aim wide with his ball finishing in the lake.
It was not all plain sailing for the Balmacewen team which could easily have been a player short for the afternoon round.
Tyrone Ratahi heard a crack and was forced to flee as a tree crashed to the fairway, missing him by less that a metre.
His golf cart was squashed.
Island Park won the senior B event, while Chisholm Park and Tapanui tied 3-3 in the intermediate final only for Chisholm Park to win 10-9 on a countback of holes.
Canterbury dominated the inaugural women's interprovincial tournament played in severe gales, cold southerly showers and even some sunshine at Alexandra during the weekend.
The young Canterbury team was far too good for the other four provinces, scoring four decisive wins and winning 24 games out of a possible 32.
The event had been a quadrangular but Tasman joined in this year.
After a vast improvement in last year's national tournament, Otago continued some good form finishing second with two wins and a half and 17.5 games. Monica Tulisi had a good tournament at No 1.
She notched three wins with her only loss to former professional Catherine Knight (Aorangi).
The acquisition of former Southland golfer Lisa Henderson is certainly a boost for Otago as she also had three wins playing at No 2.
Another newcomer, Jo Hicks-Beach, also had three wins at No 4.
