Notes; The Club was saddened by the news we lost Hall of Fame golfer Bob Simonson in 2022.
As it was the last couple of years we didn’t have a tournament director but it didn’t really matter, COVID-19 and it’s variants continued to be a problem, only one tournament was held.
After a two year absence the 2022 Tom Stead Memorial Scramble with the two person scramble format and low net scores used was sponsored by Mike and Sandie Cook and held at Rio Vista GC on Saturday, July 9th starting at 09:30 am. In the 2019 Tom Stead at Rio Vista we played on an absolutely beautiful day, temperature in the high 70’s with essentially no wind. What a difference the 2022 tournament was, the temperature was in the mid eighties but we had a very strong wind blowing ( 2 to 3 clubs, the Scottish Open had nothing on us). Play was thankfully from the up front green tees. The greens were in good shape but some faster than others. In the first flight it was the Steve Blotzer and Dave Pearce teaming up to win first place with a net score of 66 (2 birdies). Matt Hurst teamed up with Rio Vista regular Wayne Antoque to take second place with a net 67 (3 birdies). Home course favorite Ed Vegas teamed up with Al Thacker to finish in third place with a net 69 (4 birdies). The Larry Campbell, Mike Cook team finished fourth with a net 70 (3 birdies). The Vicki Devlin, Alex Tegankamp took fifth place with a net 74 (2 birdies). The Floyd Duggins, Bob Simonson team took sixth place with a net 76 ( 1 birdie). The Valero Golf Club’s closest to the pins on the front nine were won by Alex Tegenkamp and Matt Hurst, on the back nine it was Steve Blotzer and Wayne Antoque, each received a sleeve of the Titleist AVX golf balls contributed by Ed Vegas. The first place team members split $50.00, second place $30.00, third place $10.00. Our thanks go out to Ed Vegas for setting up the tournament and the winning team members who gave back their prize money and added it to our donation, we raised $210.00, make that $260.00 thanks to a generous contribution from Don Scribner for the American Heart Association in Tom’s name, total to date is $9574.00.
The 2018 & 2019 Valero Cup tournaments have not been played yet.
The 24th Club Championship was not held this year.
The “50th” annual Winners Tournament sponsored by Mike and Sandie Cook was not held this year.
Floyd Duggins carries over the # 1 Ranking. There was no Valero Golf Club’s Player of the Year for 2022.
2022 was the 21st year for the Valero Golf League, because of the Coronavirus pandemic, league play was again affected. Play continued at the Blue Rock West and East courses. The league continued to be nine hole team play starting officially at 4:30 pm every Wednesday. Playing were 6 teams of 8 players each. Steve Duff continued as the League President, Ken Hoehn took over as the League Statistician. 2022 started out with the Birds in first place after week # 1 & # 2.. The Seadlings and the Mulligans tied for 1st in week # 3 then the Seadlings for the next four weeks, the Birds then took the top spot until the last week of the regular season. At the end of the regular season the first place team (the Birds) received a bye. The Mulligans and the Tennis Pros played off on August 17th to determine who would play the Birds in the Championship Finals. The Mulligans won 3.5 to 2.5 and advanced on to play the Birds on August 24th, 2022. The Birds who lost in the championship finals in 2019 & 2020 decided enough was enough and went on to win 6.0 to 2.0 and claim their third league championship. The finals match was videoed this year by Mike Cook. The Birds finished first, the team consisted of James Johnson, Andrew Estrada, Ray Castro, George Cruz., Mike Trevino, Danny Weir and Pete Asselin. The Mulligans finished second, the team consisted of Dexter Nigos, Ron Hall, Zac Ronan, Eddie Pereira, Mike Burzynski, Antonio Santiago and Jeff Marquez. The Tennis Pros finished third, the team consisted of Jim Minkel, Dale Ramirez, Doug Nelson,, Bill Quessenberry, Fred Foote, Graham Miskella, Pat Ponce and Rob Villarreal. The Seadlings finished fourth, the team consisted of Ken Hoehn, Josh Lundholm, Randy Goudy, Jason Allen, Glen Campbell, Mike Sierras, Cody Stephens and Brad Stephens. The Rovers finished fifth, the team consisted of Steve Duff, Frank Hartig, Hadi Jammal, Jake Finnegan, Sanjeet Kamat, Kyle Massaro, Bradely Rupert and Bob Winn. The Hackers Unlimited finished sixth, the team consisted of Ben LaFountain, Ryan Murphy, Justin Blecharczyk, Sean Black, Steve Millicevich, Mason England, Ben Osborne and Matt Frits. In the individual rankings this year; Jake Finnegan started out the year as # 1 and held it through week # 4, Sean Black took over # 1 in week # 5 and held it through week # 9, in week # 10 Eddie Pereira took # 1 and held it through week # 11 where he was joined again by Sean Black, in week # 12 Sean Black held # 1 by himself and held it until the end of the regular season and through the playoffs. Sean Black ended up the # 1 ranked golfer for the year. Yearlong individual honors went to Pete Asselin who was the SOLO CUP Champion for the year, James Johnson was the runner-up. Pete Asselin broke the record for low gross score on Blue Rock – East, back nine, white tees with a 36. Also on Blue Rock – East back nine, white tees low net score in the playoffs, Fred Foote and Eddie Pereira set the initial record with net 32’s, Dale Ramirez set the runner-up record with a 33. Eddie set the initial gross record with a 37 with Dale Ramirez setting the runner-up record with a 39. Pete Asselin and Ken Hoehn broke the record for low gross score on Blue Rock – West back nine, white tees with 37’s. On Blue Rock – East back nine in the regular season Randy Goudy and Dexter Nigos tied Jake Finnegans low net score record with 29’s. On Blue Rock West back nine low net score in the regular season Steve Duff tied the runner-up record of 30 but this was later broken by Glen Campbell with a 28. Pete Asselin tied the runner-up record for low gross score in the playoffs on Blue Rock – West front nine with a 37. Post season play was limited, the good news was the VGL completed another entire season during the COVID-19 pandemic and look forward to a more normal season in 2023. Mike Cook