Did Canterbury Lack Mental Preparation For Rosebowl?

Press, Volume C, Issue 29524, 27 May 1961, Page 5

Did Canterbury Lack Mental Preparation For Rosebowl?

(THERE is no doubt that 1 Canterbury fired away its chances of winning the Freyberg Rose Bowl golf tournament at Waiohiki. Napier, last week by its miserable performance in losing four games to Waikato in the fourth round.

Waikato numerically is one of the strongest provinces in the country and in the days when D. L. Woon headed it in his grand manner, it was an efficient, even a powerful team. Temporarily at any rate, it has lost its standina. R. D. Haycock, who played at No. 1 on the strength of the medal trials in the district. simply could not comrx e with Woon and apart from B T. Boys, one of the more promising young players. and Woon himself, it was just another team in the tournament. Inexplicably, the last four Canterbury players lost their games in this match. R. E. Clements could plead that he was beaten by the excellent 70 scored by H. F. Vivian, who putted like a Bobby I«ocke. but the other losers. K D. Foxton. G. P. Vesty and B. A. Colquhoun had no such excuses. On the day. they seemed unable to stiffen the sinews sufficiently to apply even the psychological pressure which is so important a part of this match-play event. Had the defeat been a phenomenon in the Canterbury performance, it could have ascribed it to luck, force of circumstances or the fatigue which is so material a factor in the pent-up rush from one match to another in the tournament. Unhappily, within 24 hours Canterbury was at it again. After the excellent and exciting performance in rhe fifth round against Wellington, the last three men faded as quietly as the last rose of summer in the final match with Hawkes Bay and with their defeat al! hopes were over for another year. On the strength of these

two performances, it seems proper for Canterbury officials and players to consider means of training to ensure that such thoroughly slipshod performances as those against Waikato shall not recur in the future. The system of strokeplay trials which is now so strongly favoured in the North Island may be one solution, although it may not be ideal. The answer may be one of psychology. Tournament golf as demanding as the Freyberg requires in competitors the highest powers of concentration. The immediate shot is everything—but the preparation for the shot begins a long time beforehand, on the practice fairway, in. if necessary. the gymnasium and especially in sustained application in match after match. It must be confessed that, at times, the playing methods of the two finest players in the country. S. G. Jones and R R Newdick, become extremely wearisome, for they spent an eternity upon the greens, but it must also be said that in results achieved these two are models. Their percentage of error is about as low as it is possible for any amateur to reach and they take the greatest possible pains to eliminate the wasteful shot. Compare the ruinous moments to Canterbury when I S. Harvey at the seventeenth and G. P. Vesty at the eighteenth fired shots over the boundary fence. Each of these shots meant the loss not only of an individual game but also of a match; and. quite frankly, neither should have been played by such experienced competitors. The fault was psychological. The mental preparation for the shot was not right. Mr Max Turner as manager said truly enough that the principal Canterbury failing was that her players were not sufficiently accurate through the green to ensure that the first putt had a reasonable chance of falling

into the hole. This, of course, was setting the highest standard: such play is the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for all who play this incessantly difficult and demanding game. But here, too. one felt that the answer was mental preparation; and in simple terms mental preparation could well be defined as confidence in the mechanical aspects of the shot, a proper understanding of the wind and ground factors involved in the particular stroke and serenitv of mind in playing the stroke. Peter Thomson nas defined this as the art of never playing a short until one is composed for it—and. when you start dissecting his statement, what a wealth of meaning there is in it.

R. C. Murray came out of the tournament extremely well. His confidence was boosted by a tip or two from the Napier professional, E. A. Southerden, before the tournament proper began and his performance as a whole justified the thought that he must be a certainty for the New Zealand team for Australia. At times, admittedly—and these usually were associated with his tendency to let his body move—his putting was wanting, but with

the wood his baekswing was under sound control and with iron his play was accurate and Harvey no doubt deserved six of the best for that shot over the fence against H. R. Carver, of Manawatu-Wanga-nui, but on the whole this was a stronger and sounder Harvey than before and compared with the old his putting was infinitely superior. With wood, he was as good a hitter as the tournament offered and for a man of only lOst weight his power at times was astonishing. If only he could compose, and implicitly believe in. some such jingle as “I'm not just as good as the next guy, I’m better,” what a player he would be. Clements with three wins and a half came out of the tournament well enough and because he won each of his last 'two games his contribution was valuable. Foxton's best performance was against J. W. Scott, the Wellingtonian who had been unbeaten and with whom he secured a half, but from the look of him he was never at one with the tricky greens, full of rolls and borrows, which are Waiohiki’s principal terror. Vesty with four losses was painfully below his best standard and one imagines that he will not soon forgive himself that shot over the fence. Colquhoun began with a couple of good wins, did his stuff again with a splendid win over the sturdy. W. G. Horne and in between times was one who justified Mr Turner’s criticism. Golf is an athletic as well as an intellectual pastime and one sometimes wondered whether Colquhoun was fully adjusted to this aspect. It can be related here that Gary Player is accustomed to doing 70 finger-tip push-ups daily. When the whips were cracking and the Canterbury men felt that they had to defeat Wellington, they responded extremely well. The search for means of encouraging a sustained concentration could well become the provincial target over the next few months.