BGA - JIM REMLER - FIRST ANNUAL MEMORIAL GOLF TOURNAMENT AND LUNCHEON    SEPTEMBER 13, 2024

RIP - 9/10/2023

BGA Commissioner W. A. Pace holding the new Jim Remler Memorial tournament trophy.

Sol Asekun presenting the trophy to the winnerJohn Keller. 

 A close up of the new Jim Remler trophy..

Len Ciriello and W. A. holding the blank check Len uses to make contributions to charities.

Sol Asekun singing Danny Boy 

The winning team for the Whack/Hack Jim Remler tournament, John Keller, John Balais and Sol Asekun.

Joyce Remler passing out Jim Remler memorial cookies.

Pre tournament meeting showing the poster that Commissioner Pace developed to show the hole in one car prize.

Hole-In-One car prize. No winner today.

Sol Asekun passing Jim Remler memorial cookies to Randy Robertson.

Ed Ryan reading the BGA Motto.

From Commissioner W. A. Pace:

Members, I have 2 distribution lists for BGA.  

One list contains, with a few exceptions, only members that actively play with the BGA group.  The other contains many more and includes members that want to stay informed but not get the day to day emails.  This is being sent to the larger group as I think others might be interested.  

This is a brief summary of our BGA Jim Remler Memorial Tournament on September 13, 2024.

Jim passed away on 9/10/2023.  We decided to have a memorial tournament to recognize Jim and also to recognize the 50 +/- members that we lost since Jim formed the BGA over 25 years ago.

The plan is to have an annual BGA Classic each year going forward.  

For the initial tournament we asked "Hose" our contact at BGA headquarters in Grand Cayman. to suggest an appropriate special prize for the initial tournament.  Hose contacted several current members and an anonymous (sometimes referred to as unanimous) member offered up a 2001 Cadillac Deville as a hole-in-one prize for the first person scoring a hole in one on any of the par 3's on the Oaks.  

With 30 players in the tournament and 5 par 3's there were 150 opportunities to score a hole in one. Sadly there was not a winner of this prize.  At our pre tournament meeting one member was very interested in winning this car and asked if he got a hole in one and we were rained out would he still get the car.  We reassured that member that if he is the first hole in one he would get the car. 

We also had an anonymous member that contributed a substantial amount that covered the lunch that followed the tournament, that resulted, except for prize money, no cost to the tournament participants.  A hearty thank you to the anonymous contributors.  

A special trophy was developed for the winner of the first tournament.  The expectation is that the trophy will transfer to a new winner each year going forward.  I will send some pictures in subsequent emails.  John Keller was the winner of the first tournament.  

Foster Panza developed a collection of pictures from his library and displayed them from his I pad

on a television.  Foster put a lot of time in developing an album and setting up his video equipment for the group.  

During and after lunch we had a short program that included Ed Ryan reading the BGA motto, and leading the group in a patriotic song, talking about a poster that was developed to highlight the Cadillac Deville hole in one prize, a poster board that showed a collection of print pictures of Jim, Joyce read a poem to Jim, Len Cirello covered the BGA donations since Jim started the donations in 2010 and Sol recognized the many volunteers that make our club successful..

Members had an opportunity to talk about their memories of Jim.

Sol and John Keller announced the tournament winners and paid out the prize money.  Sol also presented the new trophy to John Keller,   Sol had developed a new formula (in keeping with Jim's use of a formula that had a mystery factor)..  

Sol was asked to play Danny Boy on his harmonica, a special request from one of the members.  However his plans for a harmonica version did not work out and Sol sang Danny Boy.

Most of you know that Jim enjoyed certain food groups.  Among them Ice Cream, Chocolate, Mayonnaise, Oreo Cookies, and donuts to name a few.  Our dessert was Ice Cream with chocolate syrup, and Oreo Cookies.  

You may also remember that Jim enjoyed "Birdie Booze".  A shot of whipped creme vodka after any birdie.  Clint Wynne gave a very touching toast to Jim and shots of whipped creme vodka were served .

We wrapped up with another performance by Ed Ryan and the barkies.

The game played was another Jim Remler favorite, Whack and Hack.

The team winner of that tournament was a threesome of Sol Asekun, John Keller, and John Balais.  There winning score was minus 9.

Closest to the pin on #3 was Randy Robertson.  Must have been trying really hard to win that Cadillac.

There were three notable scores.  Mike Stefani 77, Foster Panza 78 and Sol Asekun 79.

That's all folks. Thank you.