Nigel Tubman - AKVG Captain for 2025
I
Past Captains:
2024: Alan Wood, Etchinghill GC
2023: Bob Coles, High Elms GC
2022: Martyn Dines, Whitstable GC
2020/21: Dave Parker MBE, Corinthians GC
2019: Brian Rayner, Kings Hill GC
2018: Nigel Courtney, Westerham GC
2017: Eddie Ruff, Chestfield GC
2016: Bill Piper, Wrotham Heath GC
2015: Reg Greenwood, Bearsted GC
2014: Bert Bowen, Faversham GC
2013: Ian McInnis, Park Wood GC.
2012: Ian Fright; Prince’s G.C.
2011: Jim Silvester; Redlibbets G.C.
2010: Richard Hedley; Broome Park G.C.
2009: Terry Jones; Shortlands G.C.
2008: J. Clark Button; Cobtree Manor Park G.C.
2007: Norman Fisher; Hemsted Forest G.C
2006: J.D.J. Hutchins; Sheerness GC
2005: Bill Law; High Elms GC
2004: Don Bower; Canterbury GC
2003: Malcolm Cook; Woodlands Manor GC
2002: Dick Brook; Littlestone GC
2001: Glyn Jenkins; Langley Park GC
2000: Desmond Barker: Whitstable & Seasalter GC
1999: Alan Hurst; Wildernesse GC
1998: Jack Gardner; Woodlands Manor GC
1997: G.G. (Gerry) Morris; North Foreland GC
1996: John Bailey; Littlestone GC
I am really looking forward to my AKVG Captaincy year in 2025.
I was born in 1950 on a farm near Bethersden but my Kentish roots go back at least 500 years. I went to schools in Hythe, Folkestone and Dover and met my wife Diane at Folkestone Tech in 1967. We have two children and 4 grand daughters.
A shaky start to my career saw me in NZ and Australia working in admin and on a dairy farm and returned to the UK after a couple of years and eventually joined Ashford Jobcentre and remained a civil servant for 30 years finishing my career working as an adviser and project manager in Central Europe and beyond for some 15 years.
I’ve got a motorbike (a Triumph Tiger 900) and enjoy short and long trips – in the early Summer I rode down to Gallipoli (Turkey) and across to Albania and ferry to Italy and home (4600 miles). My other hobby is gardening especially growing vegetables and anything that involves machinery.
I played my first golf on the Hotel Imperial Golf Course at the age of 8. I played golf very occasionally for the next 40 years until I joined Cranbrook Golf Club (to be Hemsted Forest) but left in 2017 when the mud got to me. I joined Littlestone which many of you know is a fantastic course especially when/if the weather is fine.
I’ve been an active member of AKVG for nearly 15 years and was delighted to be asked to become Captain for 2025. It is a great honour and I hope that we will all have a memorable year and that the weather gods are kinder to us than they have been of late. We will play a fantastic number of courses and my Captain’s Prize event will be held at the Littlestone Warren course on Thursday 1st May 2025.
Our annual match against Devon will take place 1st-4th July playing Churston and Tiverton golf courses. We need a team of 16 and we are a few players short. If you are interested, please email me at nigeltubman@btinternet.com.
My chosen charity is the Young Lives Foundation based in Maidstone. They offer mentoring and support to disadvantaged young people in Kent and they are keen to get young people active and drag them away from their phones and out into the fresh air and, with your donations, I hope we can send a number of young people on a 3-day adventure course in the autumn of 2025. One of their fund-raising activities is a golf day and in 2025 they will hold an event and I hope we can put team or two together.
Carlo Nuvoletta will be a fantastic Vice Captain for 2025 and I look forward to working with him and I know you will all give us both plenty of support.
Well done to Alan Wood for his 2024 Captaincy; he will be a tough act to follow. And, many, many thanks to Nigel Courtney and Dave Parker who have done so much for AKVG over the years. I hope they will enjoy their retirement from their AKVG duties.
Nigel Tubman
23 October 2024