All the fun of the carnival!
The Community Bank Bellarine Carnival of Golf is back for 2026!
And with a couple of tweaks to the traditional format, this week of golf promises to be one of the greatest in its long history.
All your favourites are back, including the Championships Day on Saturday to kickstart the action.
But with more team events this year, we're certain that we'll have something for you and all your mates to enjoy.
Notably, let us introduce our inaugural TEAM WINE SKINS event on Wednesday, September 2. All four players will contribute a score to their team on each hole and the best team total will win the bottles of wine on offer. But if there's a tie for the top team score, they'll jackpot to the next hole and so on.
It's going to be epic!
The PGC offers its immense thanks to the team at the Drysdale and Portarlington branches of the Bellarine Community Bank for helping us bring this event to life.
Carnival Results
- Saturday 29th August - 18 Hole Stroke - Open Results - Over 55 Results
- Sunday 30th August - Mixed 4BBB Stableford - Results
- Tuesday 1st September - 4 Person Ambrose - Men Results - Women Results
- Wednesday 2nd September - Wine Skins - Overall Results - Novelty Results
- Thursday 3rd September - Gentsome - Open Results
- Friday 4th September - 2 Person Ambrose - Men Results - Womens Results
Event Stories
Friday - Champs finish with flair
There were some good scores in Friday’s 2-person ambrose events – and then there were those of the champs.
There were a host of women on and around the nett 70 mark and the runner-up combination Lynne Kirby and Julie Milne managed 69.
But their fellow Portarlington pairing of Simone Kennedy and Jen Edmanson were simply spectacular in carding a nett score of 65.5 to romp home.
The men’s was a little tighter, with no fewer than five teams finishing on a total of 66.5, with Port’s Gary Hardiman and Curlewis visitor Michael Warner winning that countback to finish fourth overall.
Inverleigh’s Andrew Breunjes and Port’s Rom Nelson overcame a double-bogey on the fourth hole to shoot a fine 65.75 to finish third, 0.75 behind the runner-up father-and-son team of Adam and Brax Shawcross on nett 65.
But using the power of two prize-winning NTP shots on the 5th and 17th holes to perfection, victory went to Jake Munday, of 13th Beach, and carnival regular, Geelong’s Dion Beasley.
Thursday - Alison’s putter sparks victory
Angela Foott and Trung Truong came up to collect the main prize, but it was Alison Curran who was the star of Thursday’s gentsomes event.The Community Bank Bellarine Carnival of Golf is no stranger to good gentsomes scores, with the two best scores on each hole counting to the team total.
But when 13th Beach visitor Alison racked up a lazy 50 off her own bat, let’s just say that her partners weren’t under a great deal of duress in terms of picking up the scoring slack.
That’s not to say Portarlington pair Angela and Trung – along with their other partner Andrew Coldwell, of Birregurra – were slouches. Far from it with Trung having 40 himself, Andrew 38 and Angela 33. But Angela and Trung were at pains to point on in their speech that Alison’s putting had been next level, “rolling them in from all over the place”.Even more amazing is that Alison is a right-hander who has only recently switched to putting from the left side!
Their team total of 101 was just enough, pipping the Geelong team of Dion Beasley, Daniel Smith, Luke Mirabile and Leigh Purser in a countback.
And only one point off the pace in third was the fourball of Harrison Haynes (Horsham), Joel Ness (13th Beach), Michael Price and Peter Garlick, both of Portarlington.
Wednesday - Evans above, how’s the timing?
Steve Evans and his team knew they had one shot at glory – and they cashed in as the big winner of our inaugural Team Wine Skins event.
The fourth day of the Community Bank Bellarine Carnival of Golf featured a team stableford event whereby each team of four tallied all individual scores on each hole and then pitted that total against the other teams in a skins format.
As it turned out, the first five holes had jackpots, carrying over four additional bottles of wine each time.
So on the sixth hole, where Evans, Garry Hardiman, Graham Durham and Paul Wilkinson each made par for three points, it was party time!
Their combined 12 points edged the next best score by a point, with Evans’ “sandy” up-and-down the spectacular decider of the first 24 bottles of wine.
“We did absolutely nothing else all day – I can’t believe it (but) we just did it at the right time,” Evans said.
The team of Neil Ryan, Marilyn Lynch, Colleen Butler and Doreen Ivess won skins on the 11th and 15th holes for a total of 12 bottles of wine.
But the most consistent team of the day was that of David Everett, Adrian Whittingham, Carolyn Everett and Joyce Curran. They had the best or equal best score on no fewer than seven occasions – eventually good enough for two wins: four bottles on the 10th hole and another 12 on the 18th hole for 16 bottles in total.
The unluckiest of the 18 competing teams was Paul Martin, Norm Milligan, Patrick Butler and Graeme Hoult, who had the equal best score on six holes, but couldn’t get there alone and left empty-handed.
Other winning teams were captained by Sam Vagg (eight bottles), Rob Moorcroft (eight bottles) and Doug Unsworth (four bottles).
Tuesday - Ambrose fields light up
Hot conditions and even hotter scoring were the orders of day three of the Community Bank Bellarine Carnival of Golf.
The twin ambrose events run across two fields featured no fewer than 208 competitors.
On the women’s side, the field was tightly bunched but eventually dominated by two teams from nearby Curlewis.
The team of Vicki Carnie, Catherine Lane, Debra Irving and Kylie Mytyk played some fine golf to record a nett score of 62.25, but it was only good enough for second as their clubmates roared home.
The team of Tammy Curtis, Deb Collishaw, Sue Webb and Diane Smith were inspired to card a fantastic nett 62 to take home the major prize.
And on the men’s side, the pace was even hotter.
The morning pacesetters were Joel Launer, Brett Arnott, Chris Otway and Portarlington pennant captain Phil Toyne who signed for a 54.625 that looked good for much of the day.
But another two all-Portarlington teams ran them down late.
The powerhouse combination of Andrew Wootten, Ross Moreland, Taylor Cameron and John Leeding were 16 under off the stick and their handicap of 1.75 left them at 54.25.
But even that wasn’t good enough when the extraordinary unit of Yani Lathouris, Matt Marles, ambrose specialist Shaun Ward and three-time club champion Brendan Larkins unleashed an avalanche of birdies – as well as an eagle – to record a stunning total of 51.5 off their 3.5 handicap.
That equates to 17 under par off the stick – not bad considering they were only one under after their first three holes!
Main picture is Chris Niven, of the Community Bank Bellarine, with the winning fourball.
Saturday - Champ shows his class
Three-time club champion Brendan Larkins played a stellar round to win the men’s Open Championship and kick off this week’s Community Bank Bellarine Carnival of Golf in style.
Larkins began with nine pars after starting on the 10th hole, but fired four birdies and just one bogey on the front nine to roar home in 69.
The nett division was won with another exemplary round, this time by Lee McMurrich, whose 67 just pipped Geelong visitor Simon Murry’s excellent 68.
McMurrich was delighted by the win, but more with having broken par for the first time – his super score of 71-4-67 including an eagle on the ninth.
The 55+ Open was won by John Anderson with a 78 off the stick, while the nett division went to Port pair Sean Rodwell (A Grade) and Lloyd Shepherd (B Grade), both with 73.
Sunday - Father and daughter rule
The weather was warm, but the golf was even hotter today as a spectacular score triumphed in the Graeme McGregor Memorial mixed 4BBB competition.
The father-daughter team of Adam and Ziva Shawcross piled on the amazing total of 50 stableford points to romp home by four points.
Remarkably, they even had a “wipe” in their score, but countered superbly with six “four-pointers”, including Adam’s eagle on the ninth.
The mother-son team of Noela Hair and the red-hot Joel Launer were next best, their 46 points featuring nine consecutive pars on the back nine.
And on the wrong side of the countback on 46, third place went to Colleen Butler and Neil Ryan who were consistent all day with 23 points on each side.
