MONMOUTHSHIRE Golf Club's incoming captain David James was well supported by many club members at his 'Drive in' on Sunday afternoon. He had a most successful weekend with the Junior Competition being won on Saturday by Connor Price who had a gross 74, net 68. Connor also won the putting competition on Sunday, and came second with his Dad in the Men's Four Ball Better Ball competition, being beaten by one point by the combination of Richard and Lewis Jones who scored an excellent 43 points to take the glory. The Powella cup was played for in the afternoon and an large field entered for the Mixed Foursomes drawn competition. The winning pair were Nigel Miles and Dawn Irving who had 41 points, being closely followed by Simon Towell and Tanya Nicholls who also had 41 points but lost out on the back nine. There then followed a buffet meal enjoyed by all and a great start to Dave's captaincy. The County championships were played last week in Raglan and Pontypool, and Monmouthshire's Julie Miles won the best net of the bronze division. Julie's first game in the match play rounds went to the 22nd hole, and after a very short break Julie was back on the course for the next round where she came up against the 13 year old Eleanor Willis from St Pierre. Although Julie played her best, Eleanor won and went on to win the Bronze competition. In the Silver division, there had to be an alteration to the normal format in that due to fog on the qualifying day, only the top eight players went on to play in the match play rounds which meant that Dawn Irving missed out by two shots to continue in the competition. Caroline Cole got through but lost her semi-final match. It has been a disappointing week for the Monmouthshire golf club ladies section. Firstly they played the qualifying round of the Welsh Team Championships against Llanwern with the match being played at St Pierre – this turned out to be a close fought contest with Monmouthshire losing narrowly. Then the following day, the Mail on Sunday team played Burghill Valley at home in the fourth round of this competition. Again, a close contest and again Monmouthshire being narrowly beaten but the team had done better this year than for many years in this national competition. The first league team played Newport Golf club on Tuesday and once again were beaten by the narrowest margin – there is now a short break in the competitive fixtures for the firsts which will enable the teams to regroup. Luckily the Second team have played their first match and kept pride alive as they halved their game with Bryn Meadows.