It was a beautiful on Sunday, January 31 at The Preserve, when Unit 49 held the finals of their year long search for their next champion. In its eighth year, the 49er Cup tournament is patterned after the PGA’s own FedEx Cup. Beginning in February and each final Sunday of the month for eleven months, players compete to gain enough points for a chance to win. The five top finishers have a leg up on the rest of the field just like the pros. This year’s top five in order of finish were: Dennis Marchand, Roger Bedard, Lan Nguyen, Don Plapinger and Tom Fitzgerald.
In the championship round, Larry Vucovich snuck up on the field with a fine net 70 to finish first. However, Dennis shot a second place net 71 to come in second and secure the Cup. In pre- COVID-19 days, the golfers usually gathered at a local restaurant to have dinner, laugh and celebrate the awards, but this year a simple ceremony of passing the trophy on from last year’s champ Gayle Heaton was socially distanced. Now in February begins the run for the 2021 49er Cup and hopefully a few more in-person celebrations.
