Many of her non-golfing friends couldn't understand why Sandra Turbide was so happy about turning 50.
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"When I turned 50 I was so excited and people were like, are you crazy?" Turbide said with a laugh on Tuesday. "I said you guys don't play golf."
Maybe now her friends will understand after Turbide shot a three-over 75 in the first round of the B.C. senior women's championship at Kelowna Golf and Country Club. That left the Maple Ridge resident one shot behind first-round leader Penny Baziuk of Sidney.
Turbide's round included four birdies and an eagle on the par- 5 10th hole, where she chipped in from left of the green. It also included a quintuple-bogey eight on the 140-yard par 3 15th that spoiled what could have been a really special round.
"I put two balls in the water," she said. "I hit the first one a little bit thin with a little fade and I don't play a fade. I was convinced that was the club, so I teed it up again with the same 7-iron. So with the third ball I changed clubs because now it was in my head. So then I was long, of course. Then I didn't get up and down. Too bad."
Turbide, who plays out of Swaneset Bay in Pitt Meadows, is returning to competitive golf after taking last year off to complete her Master's degree.
Turbide has two Pacific Northwest Golf Association Mid-Amateur championships on her resume and has had some top-five finishes in the B.C. mid-amateur and mid-masters championships.
She played in the same group Tuesday as two-time defending senior women's champion Jackie Little of Port Alberni. Little, a former Vernon resident, opened with a five-over 77. "It's always fun to play with Jackie," Turbide said. "She is a legend. Never count her out."
While Turbide is a newbie, Baziuk is now a veteran of this championship. She finished third in 2014 when the event was played up the road at Vernon Golf and Country Club. She put herself in a position to better that result with her round Tuesday, which included four birdies.
"I love this event," said Baziuk, whose family owns Ardmore Golf Course in North Saanich. "I have played in every single one since I turned 50, so this would be my eighth, I think."
She credited a hot putter with helping her master KGCC’s subtle greens. "I made a lot of good putts for birdie and I made a nice putt to save par on the 18th," said Baziuk, who had not played the course until Monday's practice round in terrible weather.
"I scrambled well and only had one three-putt. The greens have some breaks. You have to be able to read them and hopefully someone is putting ahead of you so you can really get an idea of what is going on."
Little, a five-time champion of this event, wasn't totally unhappy with her round. "You know what, I feel like I played better than I actually shot," Little said.
"I just got onto a bit of a bogey-train on the front side and it wasn't anything serious. Just a little off here, a little off there. It could have been a lot better. I played better on the back."
Little was forced to skip the B.C. mid-Amateur and mid-master tourney in Nanaimo earlier this month with a bad back. "It's still dicey," she said. "I am not going to say it's perfect. But we're working through it. I am hoping to get all three rounds in."
Karen Pultz of Surrey and Nancy Chow of Richmond are tied for third with Little at five-over par.
Meanwhile, Kelowna’s Melanie Grant finished the first day of play two strokes back of Little at 7-over 79 and in a five-way tie for seventh place in the field of 90 golfers.
Grant will play in the same threesome as Turbide on Wednesday beginning at 9:45 a.m., along with Baziuk. Little will join Holly Horwood of Shaughnessy and Lynn Kuehn on the first at 9:54 a.m.
Teri Fisher of West Kelowna, playing out of the KGCC, sits in an eight-way tie for 15th place at 82. Clubmate, Cindy Young, fired an 87, while Eileen Sallis of the KGCC and Rhonda Poullos of the Okanagan Golf Club were another stroke back at 88. Linda Aikens of the OGC finished at 80.
The B.C. Super-Senior Championship is also being contested this week and two Vancouver golfers, Horwood and Phyllis Laschuk of Point Grey, are tied for the lead after opening with seven-over 79s.
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