Greetings fellow golfers!

With daylight hours on the increase and temperatures inching higher day by day, the scents, sights, and sounds of our favorite 9 and 18-hole playgrounds will soon beckon and their greens will once again reveal their true color. Just listen into the weeks ahead – you'll hear Whack! Fore! and so much more, as our ASGA chapter revs up for 2009, what promises to be our greatest golf season yet!

As chapter directors, we have been busy during these winter months tweaking that which has proved enjoyable over the years, while creating some exciting new features for the upcoming golf season. At this time we are pleased to share with you some goals and guidelines we have put together as well as to solicit some information that will help us continue planning golf events in a way that honors our common interests.

Our primary goal is to provide several enjoyable, sociable golf outings and clinics for ASGA chapter members at a variety of golf courses in Fairfield and Westchester counties from April through October 2009. To this end we have scheduled ten 18-hole outings and ten 9-hole outings for the season as well as five golf clinics. So, almost every weekend there will be an opportunity for golf with your ASGA friends! Not only that – we are also planning a mid-summer's overnight golf get-a-way that promises to please, even beyond the links! Just wait till you see what we've got planned in this surprise package. Within a few weeks you'll receive a detailed golf events calendar, which lists all the dates, courses, costs, and types of events we plan to play.

In order to make our outings genuinely sociable occasions, the golf chairs plan, as well as possible, to mix genders equally in all foursomes, to group players of varying abilities for most events, and to mix pairings throughout the season so that we all get to meet and play golf with a variety of chapter members. Though most events involve "playing your own ball," we have planned some "scrambles" and one "Scotch ball" outing. We will soon be sending out a survey to help us prepare for the 2009 season. If you have any other ideas for golf events, or for prizes (in addition to low net and closest to the pin), we welcome your input on the survey. Look for it!

Another one of our goals for the year is to follow certain guidelines in order to facilitate the organization and conduct of each golf event. Each golf course we reserve for 18-hole events needs to know a few days beforehand how many persons will play in an outing, and the golf chairs must arrange the pairings prior to an event. Hence an email or phone call with your intent to play must be received by the golf chair in charge of organizing the event and your payment must be received by the treasurer no later than Wednesday at 6:00 pm prior to the event in order for you to be included in the pairings. Any late entries will be paired to play after all "on-time" entries, as openings allow. This guideline or those concerning 9-hole events will be announced via email by the communications chair prior to each outing.

The golf chair in charge of organizing an 18-hole event will email the order of pairings (foursomes) to all entries by Thursday evening prior to the weekend event. Late entries will be informed of their status and pairing at the golf course when the event starts. Any entry desiring special consideration for an event (e.g. an early tee-off time), must request it in the "on-time" email entry to the golf chair organizing the event. It is unlikely that any request for playing with or not playing with certain ASGA chapter members will be honored. As has been a past practice, the "double par" rule will be in effect at all golf events in order to keep play moving. Likewise, each foursome will be designated a "captain" to oversee proper golf etiquette and expedient play.

We look forward to seeing you in a few short weeks to tee it up for a fantastic season on the links and lots more laughs at the 19th hole! Play away …

~ ASGA Fairfield/Westchester Chapter Board of Directors