Air Seychelles annual golf tournament-Jean-Baptiste flies home the winner |26 November 2004

Young Jerry Jean-Baptiste flew home as the winner after a day of very good golf.

This year, 42 participants registered for the competition, including new members and one lady tourist from Sweden, who proudly said that her first coach was Raymond Morin, a Seychellois golf professional residing in Sweden.

Special mention must go to club manager Godfrey Andrade and his workers for the great job they did on the fairways and greens to make them the best they have ever been, considering the very limited resources available to the club.

The first tee-off was at 12.10 p.m. The group comprised Robin Johnstone, Louis Vandange and young member Nicholas De Commarmond.

All the groups teed off one after the other and the last one went out at 2.25 p.m. By that time, the first three groups had already reached the clubhouse waiting for their turn to play the second nine.

Andrew Hoareau had the best score of gross 30 which made him a contender for a new course record with three under par. Despite being pleased with his score as he was hitting the greens in one and two, Hoareau was under a lot of pressure as other scores on the board showed Godfrey Andrade, Sunil Shah and Jayant Mayadas close behind.

More good scores were to come from the likes of Jerry Jean-Baptiste and Joe Elisa with 30 nett each.

On the back-nine, Andrew Hoareau could not handle the double pressure of breaking the course record and winning the competition. He forced his drives causing some of them to miss the fairways, resulting in bogeys. His gross back nine score was 37 compared to 30 on the first.

His nett 65 made him the leader on the board but there were more players still to finish their rounds. Hoareau's score was not easy to beat but in came Jayant Mayadas with a gross 39 for a nett 65 to beat Andrew to second place on the count-back rule.

If at that point Mayadas was thinking of clinching the top honours, he was in for a surprise as Jerry Jean-Baptiste, who practices his golf everyday, stormed in with a gross 35 to run home with the most-sought after trophy with a nett score of 63.

Joe Elisa, Godfrey Andrade and Damien Hoareau won the prizes for best-front nine, best-back nine and nearest to the pin respectively.

Air Seychelles' public relations manager Glenn Pillay and his assistant Josie Michaud-Payet were on hand to present the prizes to the winners.