GOLF

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 34, 8 August 1925, Page 19

GOLF

BY "CHIP-SHOT 11

THE BRITISH OPEN

HEADS IN ONE

fcCNCAN'S FINE ROUND,

COMING EVENTS.

*.-.«oit B—Qutllfylng Round Senior Champion. ship, Miramar. August B—Kanul r. Otiki, at Otakl. August 81—American Amateur, at Oakmont. (September 26 to October a-N.Z. Champion-

ships »t Shirley. October 15-22— N.Z. L»dlei' Chtmplonshipi, »t Mir4mar.

English journals to hand show the surprise which the American victory was to England, which had prided itself uoon almost a certainty. Writers generally were forced to admit that the Americans won under conditions quite different to their own, the green and fairways being fast and fiery, while all American courses are usually plentifully watered. Smith and Birnii. A generous admission that the Americans "played better golf wai written by G. W. Greenwood, at the end of the first day's play, who says :— "Yet in spite of the totally different conditions the two Americans come to Prestwick, one of the most difficult and most tricky links in the world, and break the record—Smith with a 69 and Barnes with a 70. These unpalatable facts can only be explained in one way, and that is that the Americans are better and sounder players than we are. Until late in the day Barnes occupied the leading position following a perfectly compiled score of 70, with a somewhat indifferent 77. Then came Macdonald Smith with a perfectly sensational 69, which put him ahead of Barnes by two strokes. Smith's round was followed by an excited crowd of 12,000 people, who cheered him on his way, not because he is'now an American, but because he is the true type of Scottish golfer, who was born and learned his golf on the East Coast. If Smith had not flattered his army of admirers in the initial round he certainly did so in the second. His putting, which, had deserted him, only temporarily as it turned out, returned to him quite suddenly, and in the course of this phenomenal round he hud only one putt on seven greens. The wizardry started at the Cardinal, where, by holing a long putt, he was one of the very few men who obtained a 4. v From this point everything- went swimmingly. For instance, at the lone and difficult tenth, 510 yards, he placed an iron shot five yards from the pin and holed the putt for a 3—an "eagle,'-' as he described it. His one bad shot of the round was at the eighteenth, where he hooked his drive over the heads of the spectators into a bunker. He thumped the ball out over the green, chipped back, and holed the putt for a 4 amid tumultuous cheering. The American danger tv more plainly evident by the magnificent golf of James Barnes, who not only broke the record of the famous links by two strokes, but spreadeagled the prospect* of many fancied British players. Barnes gave a brilliant exhibition of scientificgolf on hard ground and in conditions generally that did sot favour low scoring. Apparently Barnes revels in glasslike surfaces and slippery approaches, for when he won the American championship at Washington four years ago the greens and the course . were like pieces of highly-polished notepaner. Realising, the danger of high, loftintr sliotn •with the mashie-nibHcfc, Barnes relied almost solely on the pitch and ran shot with a black, rusty-looking iron that in a second-hand dealer's shop would, not fetch twopence. In all respects, however, Barnes's eolf was very impressive; he drove splendidly—hitting the ball down rather than up, so that it should not be unduly deflected by the hummocky fairway and played the long iron shots up to the well-guarded greens with wonderful judgment. It was in this department of the game, perhaps, that he showed the greatest skill, for the ball, in contradistinction to the vast majority of other players almost invariably kept the line. It was a great effort of Barnes, suitably and properly acknowledged with a warm shake of the hand on the part of his partner, Aleo Herd, when the American holed his last putt for 70. Those who nave piayed at Prestwick, and those who have neve* been to this celebrated links on the West Coast of Scotland, will probably be interested in the details of Barnes's score, which are as follow:— Y°\° J-f SJyJ* ... < Hols 10-Sloydl .. ' 5 Ho c a-118yds .. 3 Hol» 11—190 yd« S Uoe 8-402yd5... 6 Hole li-«oSydl .'. 5 Ho c £-877 yds .. 4 " Hole IS-MOyds 4 Ho c 5-106 yds .. 3 Hole M-357yda 1 Ho c O-357yds .. 3 Hole 15-S2syd» 4 Ho c 7-433 yds .. 5 Hole l£ffl3ydJ 8 En 8 HOT " * Holß «-SS3yd' i 3 Hole 9-485yda .. 3 Hole 18-27»yds .. 8 Out 34 In 30 Totil 70 ■ A few words of explanation are necessary. At the third, the notorious Cardinal hole, Barnes could not reach the green against the headwind from the sea in two full shots, and had to be content with a 5. His drive to the sixth, known as the Elysian Fields, measured 320 yards; a whole-hearted "cnip" down wind that finished about fifty yards from the flag. His little running chip shot hit the back. of the hole for a 2. However, a 3 was good enough for the purpose, although Barnes thought that the gods might have been kinder to him. Some people are never satisfied.

Barnes had surely nothing to complain of regarding his treatment at the eighth hole. Here he hooked his drive into the rough, and was deeper in still with his second shot. He scrambled on to the green somehow with his third, a mighty niblick blow, and then, if. you please, holed a putt of fifteen yards for a par 4. "Ah, that's better," said Barnes, as he sauntered from the green with a whimsical smile playing over his features. His 3 at the long ninth, 485 yn.nl.-i. was better still, a full drivingi'mi shot, finishing three yards from the fliis;. This "birdie" 3, or by whatever jsiirne Uiey call it in America, evoked no uMinni>>nt. It was a case, perhaps, of 'being too overwhelmed with joy to give expression in words. A 5 at the tenth, 510 yards, was all he could expect, but Barnes certainly deserved a i at the twelfth, where he played a perfect dream of_ an iron shot. Unfortunately tho ball trickled over the green, leaving him with a horrid little chip shot over an intervening mound.

With tho exception of the renowned Alps, where ho was sciirvily treated, Barnes played the last four holes porfec]y. Jin skirted the pot bunker set in the middle of the sixteenth fairway, and got a, 3, a dangerous way to play tho hole, perhaps, but the only sure way of securing the par figure. Now we come to the Alps, where the second shot is played over a miniature mountain on to a punchbowl green in the valley beyond. A simple enough hole so long as yon bear in mind the bunker at tho bottom of the hill on tho far side. Barnes's shot was not quite strong enough, and, as Juek would have it, the boll hit the bkek boards and cannoned back into a

! Bteep shelf, the ball lying in long grass, I and at an angle of 45deg. It was one of I the most difficult shots in golf to play, j and it was made none the easier by the •j fact that he had still the sleepers to ! carry. Barne3 dug the ball out, but it i raced across the green on to the farther slope of the amphitheatre. He trickled the bail down the hill, and holed a putt of two yards for a 5, a highly satisfactory ending to a perilous adventure. Barnes drove the last green 279 yards, and for that matter so did Herd, who, by the way, had been rather overshadow- j ed by the magnificence of his partnuer." I Hftidt In One. Heads in one.are becoming as common at Berhampore as holes in one at the Hutt. Last Saturday J. D. Sievwright was struck on the forehead by a hooked ball, and lost interest in the game for a while. When will the City Council realise that it as unfair as it is dangerous to players to accept their green fees without some form of control? Perhaps the fate of the Town Council of St. Andrews, which has just been held liable for an accident to a Glasgow schoolgirl who was crossing the links on the Old Course, may suggest something to it. Sheriff Dudley Stuart held that the St. Andrews Council had failed to take sufficient precautions against accident, and assessed damages at £40 and costs. There are minor dangers at Berhampore, such as leaving a shoe in some of the cowtrodden bogs that dot the fairways, but they do not cramp the player's style nearly »o much as the habit of ducking automatically to tha cry of "Fore T" by which all the golfer* who have graduated at Berhampore may be known. Nottl. Conditions were ideal for the Webb Memorial and qualifying round for the junior championship run conjointly at Miramar last Saturday, but the scoring was not brilliant, 85's net qualifying. The links have dried up so mucE that the effect of the rains is little more than a memory, and the grass is coming away so rapidly that the mowers are kept busy. "What little of the fairways is cut about by drains comes under the "ground under repair" rule, bo that there was no excuse for the high scoring on a still, mild day. That there was little amiss with the links is shown in. the splendid card returned in the seniors by A. D. S. Duncan, who is playing the best of his outstandingly fine golf at present. He returned a 71, which read: Out, 444333544, 34. In, 363434455, 37. Total ■ 71. And this with a 6 at Toetoe! Duncan was playing well up to his plus 3 mark. J. H. Drake, on scratch, did not do so well aa the week before, when he returned a 72, but his 77 had only one 6 in it, and his card was an even one. A. E. Conway is having difficulty in getting an 18 hole run of his best, though he seems to turn in a good nine on .every appearance. S. S. Stichbury, on a handicap of 5, did a very useful 84 gross. Golfers who are late handing in their cars, and put them in the box after everybody else has been in some time, may be quite prepared to have them discovered some time afterwards. This happened in the case of an excellent card in the Doughty Memorial unconditional bogey handicap, when A. M. Anderson and S. M. Hobday, 6 up, were, omitted from the list.!

The pl»y-off for the Doughty Memorial Cup at Miramar between J. H. Drake and H. E. H. Aplin and O. J. Wilson and E. O. Hales resulted in a win for the former, 4 up. :

On an Australian links the other day a crow ceized the ball, and had to be chased by both flayers for a while before it dropped it. His Royal Highness the Duke of York recently made a perfect drive of 200 yards when opening the second public golf course at Kichmond Park, nsing the driver supplied to the Prince of Wales when he opened the first course in the park two years ago. There was no sign of nervousness in the Koyal golfer, though there was a large gallery. Since the first course on the park was opened in ■ June, 1923, nearly 200,000 rounds have been played on it, and it has been a common experience to have mere than 250 rounds on it on a fine Sunday; indeed, it became necessary' to open another coarse to lessen the pressure. In the fourball at Waiwetu, Balfour and Feist (Greytown) were playing first-rate golf, talcing the first and eighth, the two longest holes, in 3's. Finishing in the Waiwetu-Qreytown match at Waiwetu on Saturday, in the dusk, B. ■ O. Kirk and H. K. Adamson had an unfortunate experience. As they approached the last hole both were 2 up on bogey, but Kirk diacovered on holing out that he had played Adamson's ball, which prevented them from tying for first place. Walter Hagen has signed a two-year contract with the Pasadena Golf Club, to commence Ist December next, at £6000 a year. Waiwetu has interesting historical associations. Mr. E. 0. Kirk, welcoming Greytown players there on Saturday, called their attention to the fact that they were playing on the birthplace of golf in the North Island, as golf was commenced there in 1892. Only one of the original greens remained. The Trot^ ing Club, said Mr. Kirk, had been allowed to cut away an interesting landmark, the ground known as "tha mound," in the centre of the course. In the earliest days, prior to 1855, that high ground was the only land above high-water, and it was known, and Crown-granted, separately as "Fre* they's Island." Then the earthquake of 1855 forced all that part of the country up at least five feet. The high ground wa« no longer an island, and by later legislation the ground was vested in trustees for the Trotting Club. The old "mound hole" has disappeared in the course of excavation inroads for work on other parts of th# trotting course. The remains of thp mound are now in the middle of the fairway at the first hole. Mr. Thompson, replying for the visitors, recalled the fact that some 30 years ago Mr. Kirk was a familiar visitor to Greytown, having won the Wairarapa rifle championship at Papawai, and pointed out that there wero sons and nephews of Mr. Kirk's then competitors playing at Waiwetu that day. The open golf championship of Australia was won at Kensington (Sydney) last week by Fred. Popplewell, who 'is professional to the Australian Golf Club, on his home course. The run-ner-up was T. A. Howard, the Concord (Sydney) professional, whtf was open champion in 1923. The open championship of the Commonwealth thus passes back into professional hands. It was won at Sandringham (Melbourne) last year by an amateur in Alex. Russell, who again acquitted himself well, tieing with 11. R. Sinclair for third place and for the honour of being first amateur on tho open championship list. Sinclair went on to confirm his right to the position by winning tho amateur championship. After surrendering the title which lie won in 1921 and hold for n, year only, C. K. L. Fairchild, of Bongor, regained tho close championship uf flic. Welsh Golfing Union recently by heating IJ. S. Emery, of Glamorganshire, in the 3G holes final by 10 up mid 8 t<j play, Play won tia lbs link* of Hit lUiyl Olu»-