SLOW GOLFERS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LVI, 14 July 1925, Page 2

SLOW GOLFERS

A CULT WITHOUT ADVANTAGE

(By Harry Vardon, Six Times Open Champion .J

LONDON, May 28. The subject of the playing pace at gelf has lately attracted a good deal of attention. Nor is tliat matter for surprise. My own experience is that there are more slow players now than at any time in the past, and that is. saying a lot. The harassment that they cause to people, who want to go round the course at a normal fate of progress, hardly needs to be emphasised. Nothing is more trying and nothing is more calculated to put. a golfer off his game than the ordeal of being kept waiting before playing every shot by the dilatory methods of an individual ahead. In a short time, the sluggard has behind him a trail of people who arc hold up by his slowness. Everybody is fretting and fuming—and with considerable justification—and yet no satisfactory way of dealing with the trouble has yet been evolved. We have, perhaps, two notoriously slow players in professional golf. It- lias sometimes been suggested that anybody who allows the habit to take possession of him should be placed at the end of the draw m stroke competitions, so as to have the opportunity of taking his own time without occupying that of the other players. So far, however, this rather drastic proposal has not been put into operation, possibly because the feeling in strong that, where there is a draw for partners, there ought to be no semblance of meddling with it. And so, when one of the laggards is drawn early, those who follow linn have to suffer for their loyalty to principle. With very few exceptions, however, I think that professionals play at a reasonable pace. lb is amongst club members that the tendency towards procrastination is increasing, no doubt because they have Jess confidence - than professionals arid fall little by little, into the way of taking a long while over sthots. Presumably they are thinking of a variety of things that, they ought to do in order to achieve the desired result., and waiting in the hope; that concentration and inspiration will ultimately take possession of- them and enable them to strike their shots aright.

CONJURING UP DIFFICULTIES In point of fact, tjhorr never has been a slow golfer among the outstanding players of the game, and I fail to« see how long-drawn-out preparations can ever be a help. They develop simply into a liabif, and it is a habit that does far more harm than good to the individual's own golf. It is surely indisputable that the more a player prepares for a shot, the more he thinks about the. possibilities of failure. Otherwise, he would not delay unduly. One has to be reasonably careful. Slap-dash golf is successful only in the case of an unusual player with an unusual temperament, as, for example, George Duncan, and it- is not always successful then. Even now, I find myself mentally repeating the golden principles as 1 address the ball: — “Slow back”; “Head still”. But to engage in an elaborate process of theorising and finessing is likely only to be fatal to the chances. The mental strain is not- only bad mentally ; it usually communicates itself steadily to the muscles and causes them to develop a condition of tautness which hinders the freedom of the swing. I believe that some people say that they spend a lot of time on the putting greefn —walking up and down the line, studying it first from the ball and then from the hole and then starting all over again, prowling about apparently looking for loose impediments, and engaging in every other form of seeming caution—not because they are really worrying about any of these things, but because they feel that they must wait until the feeling comes upon them that they ,can hole the hall, 5 But- do they hole it? Not more often, I think, than the average player who takes normal time over the stroke; perhaps less often. The late Willie Park, whose death was announced a few days ago, and who was without question the finest putter I ever saw, never made tills hard work of the short game. He took his line from the ball in one easy, quiet survey .and then .putted. And. my conscience! he could hole that ball.

ON BEING READY It is not only in putting, however, that a great deal of time is wasted. There are many golfers who begin the play to the hole badly by walking on to* the teeing ground in a- desultory frame of mind. If the caddie happens to be slow at making a tee—and slowness is catching—it takes this kind of golfer a long while to get going. He waggles and waggles until he is in something akin to a trance. It does him no good, and it is very wearisome for his opponent or partner. There is nothing better when you Walk oh to the teeing ground than to make up your, mind that you'are going to hit the hall without a( lot of ado. Excessive waggling only serves to promote a. stiffness in the knees—at anv rate, in most instances—and so to spoil the swing. It is a good sign when a player prefers to make his own tee. It indicates that he is ready to hit the shot, and is keen to get on with the job.

Similarly, the. golfer who trains his mind in the right wav. pretty well decides how to play a shot, through the green while he still walking towards the ball from the spot at which he despatched it. Unless the player cultivates this manner of being decisive on reaching the hall, he is—if keen—sure to do top much thinking and waggling. And so he soon loses the distance of a hole or two to the couples in front, and reduces those behind to respair.