Golfers perform well

Press, 25 January 1989, Page 21

Golfers perform well

Tony Christie received a timely boost to his golfing confidence when he finished joint runner-up with his Canterbury team-mate, Alastair Sidford, in the Leopard New Zealand junior tournament at Hastings at the week-end. “That’s what I was looking for with the Canterbury stroke championship approaching,” the 1988 Canterbury junior "golfer of the year” said yesterday. Christie, who rose to

prominence in New Zealand junior golf by winning the Hastings event last year, started the last round as joint leader with the Taranaki Government Life representative, Grant Moorhead.

But at the finish of the 72hole tournament it was a Waikato junior, Michael Long, the reserve for the national senior team which competed in Argentina last December, who succeeded by a stroke from the Canterbury duo.

Long played the back nine of the final round in fiveunder par and chipped in four times. His chip for an eagle at the seventeenth was the telling shot.

Long carded rounds of 73, 73, 77 and 71 for his 294; Christie scored 73, 76, 71 and 75 and Sidford carded 73, 71, 77 and 74 for their 2955. Moorhead and the world schoolboys’ champion, Steven Alker (Waikato), were equal fourth on 296.