GLEDDOCH golf ace Graham Barr is celebrating a record-equalling fourth club championship victory.

Graham, who’s been a member of the Langbank club for 17 years, saw off Greenock golfer Craig Thomson in the semi-final of the match play competition.

He then clinched the tournament by winning a showdown against fellow Gleddoch member and three-time champion Danny Rainey.

The win matches a 21-year record held by Sandy Riddell who won his fourth honour at Gleddoch in 1999.

Graham told the Tele: “I’ve managed to win four of the last nine years.

“It’s been my home course since I started playing golf so I know it like the back of my hand.

“I think there are five people on three wins and I’ve been the first person to get four since Sandy Riddell in the 90s.

“That’s been a big goal of mine for the past few years because I won my third in 2017, so I am delighted to get there in the end.

“I’ve been pretty desperate to get to that fourth one.

“The final finished 6 and 5. I was 9 up after the first round and then the second round became about getting over the line. It wasn’t the prettiest second round but I got there in the end.

“For the semi-final I played Craig, who plays off the scratch, so that was a big win.

“In the final I played Danny. He’s won three championships up there before and has been a member of the club for a number of years.

“It’s the second time we’ve played each other in the final and it must be the fourth time we’ve played each other in the championship, so we know each other pretty well.”

Graham was delighted to get back on the fairways after the recent restrictions due to the coronavirus pandemic.

He said: “We’ve been lucky at Gleddoch that we got competitions back in the middle of June.

“We have a reasonably-sized membership of about 300-350. A lot of clubs have struggled for tee times. We were busy but there was still scope for tee times and we were able to get competitions back quite quickly.

“Looking back in May it looked unlikely that we would even get the club championship played.

“It’s an important competition so it was great we could get it played.

"We were lucky to have a bit of time to get back into the swing of things before holding the club championship.”

Graham, who is a marketing executive at Scottish Golf and director of fans’ group Morton Club Together, already has his sights set on a record fifth title in 2021.

He added: “The plan is to beat the record next year - but there are a few people who will want to stop that from happening!”