Wildwood celebrates centennial with golf outing
From left, the foursome of Ben Meyer, Brady Lorenzen, Clark Cipra and Bill Watson emerged as Championship Flight champs by shooing an 18-under, 18-hole score of 54.
By John Burbridge sports@charlescitypress.com
CHARLES CITY — Be careful of what you wish for.
In the weeks leading up to Wildwood Municipal Golf Course’s “Centennial Celebration” to commemorate the course’s 100th anniversary, park superintendent Joel Bruner mentioned that during a rather wet season last year that he only used the park’s irrigation system nine times.
How often does that happen during a course of a century?
Going into this past weekend, it looked as if Wildwood would finally get the rain it needed — just in time for the celebration.
But the rains that hit the area on Friday night subsided in time for the celebration’s four-man, best-ball tournament. And aside from an overcast sky and a touch of humidity that did more to take the chill out of an otherwise cool day, it was a perfect day for golf.
Or at least the team of Clark Cipra, Brady Lorenzen, Ben Meyer and Bill Watson found the conditions favorable enough to shoot an 18-hole, 18-under score of 54 to win the Champion Flight division.
“It was a little more difficult than the last time we played here,” said Cipra of the recent changes to Wildwood’s No. 5 and No. 6 holes — the latter 180-yard, Par-3 being a whole new hole — put in play for the first time at the tournament.
“But I like the way the course is set,” Cipra said. “It poses a challenge.”
None of the foursome are Charles City residents, but Cipra, Meyer and Watson recently played at Wildwood earlier this spring.
“And when we heard about the (Centennial Celebration), we decided to do this,” Cipra said. “We just needed to pick up another guy.”
Lorenzen (that other guy) insists that he’s now a “ringer.” But then again, the team could have picked worse.
A former multisport prep star at Grand Meadow, Minn., Lorenzen has some school golf record scores set more than 10 years ago that still stand today.
“I golfed here once before, but I was real little then,” Lorenzen said.
Bruner also played in the tournament. But despite one of his teammates declaring imminent victory in the days leading up to the event, Bruner’s team placed fourth in Championship Flight.
“It’s just hard running a tournament then jumping in to play it,” Bruner said. “We didn’t putt well today, and that’s what if often comes down to.”
The next major event at Wildwood will be the annual Brad Sawyer Memorial Tournament on July 22.
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