It has been a good year for Newark Golf Club’s Charlie Lager — on and off the course.
He managed to win his club championship and welcomed his first son into the world, George Valentino Lager, in February, providing eight-year-old daughter Milita with a brother.
Winning the championship at Newark has been a goal for Lager for a long time and he has now managed to achieve this feat while also finishing under par in the event.
Lager had a first round score of 73 followed by a second round score of 68 making a 141 total and finishing 11 shots clear of second place as he stormed home on the scorecard.
“The weather was set to be a grueling 37 degrees, but I paced myself for the 36-hole tournament ahead,” said Charlie Lager.
“I ended up winning the event which was great because it was something I’ve been wanting for a long time.
“2022 has been a great year for my family and my golf.”
He has been a member at Newark Golf Club for 11 years and has previously won the Halam trophy in 2016 which is open to the top-eight finishers in the Scratch Cup who play off on a knockout matchplay basis.
Lager was a director at the golf club for three years, including two of them over the course of the covid pandemic.
“My initial ambition was to reinstate the Greens committee and kickstart the process of putting funds back into improving the golf course,” said Lager.
Lager went on to say that they improved the main playing grass areas and implemented widespread improvements.
The introduction of new machinery and technology was essential to these developments.
Lager is still a member of the greens committee.
“The greens committee’s aim is to assist the head greenkeeper and form an annual plan going forward to make more improvements to the golf course.
“We are a team of eight including the chairman, head greenkeeper, vice captain and our golf professional and we hold meetings every six weeks.
“In general things are improving,” he said.
The 52-year-old loves his sport and plays for enjoyment, as well as fitness.
“I still play football for Sutton-on-Trent on Sundays and golf regularly,” said Lager.
“My grandfather and father were quite serious golfers,” he said.
“My dad helped me get into the sport by giving me my first clubs.”
Lager turned pro in 2004, and has previously won the club championships at Belton Park, Nottinghamshire and Norwood Park.
In his first year on the Europro tour, he made the cut in eight out of ten tournaments and won at Owston Hall. The week before the club championships at Newark, Lager won the individual and team away captains day at Peterborough Milton golf club.
“It’s certainly been a good year so far,” said Lager.
He won two trophies for that event and all of the winnings went back into the captains charity.
Lager went on to win even more prizes at the Howard Roberts captains golf day a few weeks later in Newark.
“Our captains golf day was at Newark on Saturday, July 30 and my form had kept good (over the course of the month). I managed to produce the lowest gross score winning some more great prizes.
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