LADY GOLFERS.

Press, Volume LXV, Issue 19610, 4 May 1929, Page 11

LADY GOLFERS.

THE AMERICAN CRUSADE. BILL FOR BRITISH TITLE. (specially wbittek 1-ok TH2 pkess.) (By Harry Vardon, Six Times Open Champion.) It is announced that at least three players from the United States will take part in the British Ladies open championship at St. Andrews, in May. They are Miss Glenna Collett, the present American champion; Miss Marion Hollins, winner of that title in 1921; and Miss M. Orcutt, runner-up two years ago. It is no slight to the others to say that the one whom we know best, and regard as the strongest of these challengers, is Miss Collett. She is usually described by Americans as the most accomplished lady golfer ever produced by their country, where she has won the national championship three _ times as well as many other distinctions; and ! I should say" that the popular verdict lis correct.

She impressed everybody here from the. moment when, on the occasion of* her debut in the annual match between ladies and men at Stoke Poges, London,. she beat Mr C.J. H. ToUey by 1 one hole under the usual handicap terms! of Mr Tollev conceding a half. ; It was" the kind of performance that one might have expected from Miss Joyce Wethered or Miss Cecil Leitch, but-hardly from any other lady player. It was the more notable from the fact tbat she caught her rival just about at the top-of his form. .".','''■ I • Miss Collett has the touch of the born golfer to her very finger-tips. , She is small; nearly all the American golfing ladies are small by comparison with , their British ;: cousins." But she drives I very nearly as far as Miss Wethered.

The Simple Way. Miss Collett produces her effects with a "minimum of preparation. She is the typical good player .in the sense that she makes the game look easy. Iler preliminary, waggle at the -I ball is the veriest trifle. • It is hardly a flourish; it is a modest little ceremony of loosening the wrists preparatory to placing the club-head behind the ball. In this respect, she resembles he.r renowned fellow-countryman on the links, Mr Bobby Jones. There is an utter absence of fuss. . Hypercrities say that her swing with iron clubs is too long, and that she hits the ball with too little snap—that snap like the closing of a clasp-knife. But that is the way of the Americans They undoubtedly swing further with their- irons than the leading British players do. The reason is that they cultivate a follow-through. Few people realised the qualities of Mcdonald Smith as an iron player, with his rather pompous swing, until he beat Ueorge Duncan at Gleneagles on the occasion of one of his early visits to Britain. • Only twenty-five years of age, Miss Collett—with the accent on the last syllable—is a striking candidate for the British ladies' championship. She ha& conquered the one weak point which revealed itself in her game when she lost to Miss Wethered at Troon in 1925. On that occasioin, she was strangely nonplussed by the chip shots of about thirty yards. She did not seem to be able to make up hec mind as to how shs ought to play them; it was the more curious because in all the other shots, she was virtually as good as the winner at her best. _ „ .' , Two chips which <Miss CoJlett missed, a* critical stages settled "thfe issue of their match.

The Young Idea. It is conceivable that Miss Enid Wilson, the 18-years-old English native champion, will add considerably to her reputation in this tournament. Even may she win it. No good purpose can be served by adopting the attitude, as our eonser vatism sometimes bids us do, that it is bad for young players to encourage them to think a lot of themselves. Miss Wilson must know her own powers very well and if she maintains her confidence she will be difficult for anybody short of a Miss Wethered to beat. It is by stimulating self-reliance and the desire for high honours that the Americans evolve youthful, golfers of the front rank, and it seems rather churlish to set down the principle, as many people do in this country, that girls and boys ought not to go in quest of big game at golf. Miss May Hezlet was only sizteen when she became British lady champion; Miss Leitch was a semi-finalist for the title at the same aee- and Miss Wethered, like Miss Wilson, was English champion at oighteen. Miss Wethered Analysed. Presumably Miss Wethered and Miss Leftch are Remaining in retirement from championships. ,1 see that American authorities have been analysing the methods of Miss Wethered from the slow-motion film of her swing, and have come to the conclusion that her style primarily that, she keep* her left heel fixed to out the back-swing-" an v error that goes to the very root of bad form ' they declare. It is certainly not the waTthat is taught, nor the way of most first-class players; it is an ™exorable rule Of instruction that as the club goes back for anything like a long shot the left heel must be raised from the * U Thev find even greater horror in the ci«unTstances tbS Miss Wethered does l ift the left ■ heel .joat after the fmpact-which is the wrong pace according to seisatific teaching. "She is seen balance* e% feth toes in a way that must make for rftcertainty. Bather curiously, it seems m her ease to make for certainty. The truth is that Miss Wethered can make play with her ankle-joints, as I used to do in a wav that secures the essential of bodily po*se. It does not follow that everybody can do the same.