UNUSUAL GOLF SHOTS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXIII, 23 November 1928, Page 7

UNUSUAL GOLF SHOTS

166 STROKES FOR A SHORT HQLE

(By Hurry Vurdon, Six Times Open Champion)

(Specially Written for "The Mail")

What is the proper procedure in these circumstances? The question is raised by a correspondent who sends me particulars of a curious incident at golf. A player's tee shot, to a, short hole finished in an open motor car standing' on the turf some thirty yards beyond the putting-green. If he had the right to open tho door of the ear, lie could make a straight and fairly simple shot towards the pin.

After some reflection, he decided not to take ibis liberty, and there can be no doubt, I think, that, he acted properly in discarding such a. means of alleviating the position. At any rate, the rules committee once determined in the case of somebody who opened :i gate which interfered with the swing of his (dub, that he must lose the hole for it, and obviously the same regulation would apply to a door. The car-trapped golfer might, conceivably have .sought the aid of rule 11. This rule gives ;i catalogue of articles —some of (hem encountered fairly often on golf courses, others seen very seldom. They include clothes, nets, wheelbarrows, vehicles, and "similar obstructions.'' and it says that a ball lying in, or touching, such an obstruction may be lifted and dropped without penalty.as near as possible to the place where it. lay, but not nearer to the hole.

A motor car is certainly 'n vehicle, so thai the player in question could have dropped bis ball behind, it and had the obstacle wheeled out of the line of bis shot. Instead of that, lie entered the cur, chipped from the mat to within a few feet, of the pin, holed his putt for a three, and went, on to win his match, which only shows hoy appreciatively the gods of golf regard persons who honour the spirit of the game.

In tin age—a degenerate age, as tho survivors of previous generations regard it —which has granted permission to the golfer to go back and have another shot when he finds his ball in a position that he deems unplayable, it is good to know that there are people prepared to stand or fall by rule 0. To those reared in places where golfing traditions (duster and the spirits of the ancients are ever Hitting about the links, this rule is the first and last commandment of the game, it is simply that "a ball must be played wherever it lies or the hole be given up." Always good to observe is the determination to play the ball where, it lies—no matter how badly it lies. Have we not been moved to boundless admiration by the spectacle of James Braid hitting a shot from among the sleepers ami stones and steel on the railway track alongside the old course at St. Andrew's? A "FLOATER'S" ADVANTAGE For sheer strength of purpose, however, I think that a lady golfer, of whom I was told the story during my last tour in the United States, deserves the palm. She was taking part in a qualifying competition at the Shawnee Country Club, Philadelphia. It happened that the number of players was just sufficient to fill the qualifying places; but, as there was a special prize for the best score, the competition had to be decided.

To qualify was merely a matter of returning a score, no matter how high. At a short hole, this lady hit her tee shot into a stream. She was using a floating ball, so she and her husband, who was acting as her caddie, put out in a boat to play the hole to a finish or perish in the attempt. Shots by the score she aimed patientlv from her precarious stance in the skiff; each time a cloud of water rose upon the occupants of the boat, but the ball always fell back and Went on swimming. A mile and a quarter they rowed down stream in their great task, and then at last she made such an astonishingly good shot that she not only got the'ball hack to hind, but hit it into the middle of a wood. At this distance from the courseabout a mile—nobody knew whether the wood was out of bounds or a legitimate obstacle to anybody who approached, the hole in the manner which she had adopted. So she played her way back fortunately, she was on the right side of the stream—and holed out in Hit.! strokes, which was 103 worse than bogey, and for which the club awarded her a special cup.

HORSE-PLAY It needed determination of a rather different kind to play a shot which J. H. Taylor executed in a foursome in which he and I were on opposing sides. It was at Kilspindie. The late Lord Wemyss was following the match on horse-back, and, at one hole, Taylor's partner hit a shot which made their ball finish exactly under the horse. Taylor wanted the animal removed—but Lord Wemyss—a rare sticker for observation of the rules—pointed out that it was something "growing"' and that therefore it could not be "moved, bent, nor broken." The horse, being a well-trained creature, was not going to stir until it had the signal from its rider, so Taylor took up his position under it to play the stroke. If he bad one eye on the ball during the process, he had the other eye on the horse's hoofs, but he brought oil the shot.