David Clarke & Mick Gooch combined well to win round four of the Winter League at Thetford Golf Club but it was runners-up Tony Brooks & Ross Sanford who stretched their lead in the overall competition.
Clarke, who plays off five, and 17-handicapper Gooch came in with 44pts in the Four-Ball Better-Ball competition on Sunday in their first outing of the season. The highlights of the round were Clarke's birdies at the 6th, 10th and 16th.
Brooks & Sanford added 42pts to their tally for a total of 153 and a seven-point lead over the rest of the field with two rounds left to play. Sanford birdied the 5th and then finished strongly with further birdies at 16 and 18.
Third place went to Neil Elers & Ashley Forbes with 39pts, beating Shaun Langham & Richard Scott on countback. Elers/Forbes are second overall with 146.
The next round of the competition is a foursomes on Sunday January 26 with the final 4BBB round on February 16.
Full scores - Sunday's round: 44 David Clarke (5) and Mick Gooch (17); 42 Tony Brooks (12) & Ross Sanford (4); 39 Neil Elers (9) & Asley Forbes (8) and Shaun Langham (6) & Richard Scott (11); 38 Rob Bentley (13) & Peter Stelling (12), Paul Hensby (12) & Richard Alger (5), Gareth Mills (4) & Dean Scott (4) and Josh Chamberlain (2) & Brian How (11); 37 Mike Horley (5) & Ian Ramsay (4), Phil Beer (8) & Kevin Cooke (7), Chris Foulds (16) & Matt Foulds (8) and Mark Henfield (5) & Paul Pearce (5).
Winter League overall (after 4 of 6 rounds): 153 Brooks/Sanford; 146 Elers/Forbes; 143 John Ward & Peter Croker; 141 Beer/Cooke; 139 Brian Youngs & Norrie Dickson; 133 Barry Allen & Andrew Bremner and Paul Waters & Nolan Guthrie; 131 Paul Hensby & Richard Alger.
Maurice Anderson won the January Seniors Stableford with 38pts, pipping Alan Brown on countback. Ten-handicap Maurice had birdies at the 15th and 17th which proved decisive, as 13-handicap Alan finished with four consecutive bogeys.
Other scores: 36 Bob Pateman (8), Graham Pitcher (10) and Dave Smith (19); 35 Ken Groves (16), John Baldwin (10), Bob Fletcher (9), Terry Blacktopp (6) and Mark Heffer (10); 34 David Sutton (12), Bob Richards (22), Gary Goodchild (14), Alan Ashcroft (21) and Martin Engwell (18).