STORIES OF ST. ANDREWS

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 August 1932, Page 7

STORIES OF ST. ANDREWS

FAMOUS OLD GOLF COURSE When Bobby Jones first visited the Old Course at St. Andrews, ’way back in 1921, when he was a young and impressionable man of 21, he said it was the worst course he had ever seen. Years later he said it was the finest course he had ever played on. But in coming away disillusioned and disappointed from his first visit to it—he could not understand why the course had defeated him —Jones was no different from thousands of other golfers paying their first visit to the oldest golf course in the world.. ’J’wenty-five years ago, excited and thrilled (writes “A Roving Player” in the London Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News), I went to St. Andrews to pay homage at the shrine of golf. Like Jones, I had an unexpected shock. I gained the impression that it was the flattest, most uninteresting, the easiest, and, at the same time, the most unfair course on which I had ever played. Then I received another shock. One day, going out in the teeth of half a gale, I was surprised to find that the course had entirely changed, and instead of the golf being easy and comfortable it became extraordinarily difficult, a condition reflected in my score, which became swollen to undignified proportions.

But I comforted myself with the thought that from the turn everything would be all right, for I should then have the wind at my back. Imagine my astonishment when, on turning for home, I found the wind still blowing in my face, and the golf more * difficult than ever. To my friend I said, “This is very curious,” to which he replied, “Not at all. If you play here long enough you will know that on no two successive days does the course play the same; in fact, the conditions of the morning arc often dissimilar to those of the afternoon. This is the joy and the fascination of St. Andrews.” Because of the unexpected always happening, the course is tantalisingly, fascinating. As a frion'd of mine once said, “You never know where it is going to rise up and strike you straight between the eyes.” It leaped at Bobby Jones, for in the third round of the championship he took 43 to reach the turn, and, to use his own words, “I was finally goaded into the ,disgraceful act of picking up my ball after taking a pair of sixes at the 10th and lithe holes.” This was the memorable occasion when, at the short 11th, known as the Eden, he put his tee shot into the great Strath bunker, and his fourth shot clean over the green into the Eden Estuary. After putting between his legs as a gesture of contempt, Jones told the marker to tear up his card. Five years later Jones returned to St. Andrews and before he had played two rounds, “I had begun,” he says, “to love the course, and I love it now.” £5OO A HOLE. In a modest little book published by J. and G. Innes, of St. Andrews, there is a collection of stories and incidents relating to the greatest course in Christendom, in addition to which there are some useful hints on how to play each and every hole. However, the hints apply only to conditions when there is no wind, a rather remote contingency, at least so far as my experience goes. Wind or no wind, the advice will be of assistance to the average player, whose one concern is in keeping to the line where there is least likelihood of being trapped in the army of hidden bunkers scattered about the course. It will astonish a good many people to know that in his 50 years at St. Andrews Andra Kirkaldy’s best ball score made with the gutta is the amazing one of 43, the figures for each of the IS holes being: Out. 2,3, 2,3, 3,2, 3,1, 2—21; in. 2,1, 2, 3. 4,2, 3,3, 2—22; total, 43. One of the most remarkable matches played on the Old Course was nearly 70 years ago, when Lord Kennedy and a Mr. Cruiekshank played three holes after dark for a wager of £5OO a hole. The only assistance permitted was a lanter.n lighted by a candle stuck on the flagstick. Two of the holes were halved, but- it is not known which of the two players pocketed the odd £5OO. Four years ago, to celebrate the appointment of Angus Hambro as captain of the Royal and Ancient Club, the first and last holes were lit by lanterns, electric light bulbs, and motor headlights. Four members of the club drove off after 11 p.m., the first hole being halved in 4, (he par figure, and the last halved in 5.

In 1876 David Strath, then open champion, backed himself to go round the course in moonlight unde]’ 100. He was round in 95 without losing a ball, a feat which many a. single figure handicap player has failed to accomplish even in daylight. Perhaps the most unusual bet ever associated with the history of St. Andrews is recorded in the minutes of the Royal and Ancient Club under date November 3. 1820, as follows: — “Sir David Monchieff, Bart, of Monchrielf, backs his life against the life of John Whyte-Melville, Esq., of Strathkiness, for a new silver club as a present to the St. Andrews Club, the price of the club to be paid by the survivor, and the arms of the parties to be engraved on the club and the present bet inscribed on it.” Thir (ven years later Whyte-Melville fulfilled the duty imposed upon him by the best. and delivered to the captain of the club a silver putter, now one of the treasured possessions of the Royal and Ancient. Of the many phenomenal sho'ts which at one time or anoflier have been played at St. Andrews, probably the most startling was Ted Blackwell’s drive with the gutta ball to the last green. The shot finished at the foot of the steps leading to the clubhouse, a distance of 368 yards., On his 23rd birthday that gallant officer and golfer, the late Freddy Tait, drove a gutta al the same hole 341 yards, the carry. with no helping wind, being 250 yards.

It is a rare occurrence for a player to drive into the Swilken Burn, but two years ago, I saw J. T. Bookless, the Scottish international, do so, a distance of 350 yards.