HIGH SCORING

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 102, 21 July 1927, Page 9

HIGH SCORING

IN AMERICAN OPEN DUE TO THE COURSE For the past five years the American open championship has been won with scores of under 300, the scores from 1922 to 1926 inclusive being 288, 296, 297, 291 and 293. It was therefore somewhat surprising that this year the event should see a winning tie of 301, when one of the finest collection of golfers in the history of golf was competing, but the reason for this is perhaps best explained by the fact that the course is nearly 7,000 yards long, and that much of the play was through “rain-swept bunkers, and bogs.” The course j.s best described by the following American comment: “The victorious gent who strolls into the clubhouse winner of the national open at Oakmont, June 16, will assuredly be entitled to his spoils. More so than almost any other winner in the history of the national crown play.

“Not only will be have flashed to the fore over the greatest and largest field ever assembled, but he will have won over the longest and most pitiless course in the lengthy record of national plays, either here or on the other side of the big 'drink.’ “The cold figures which show Oakmont, near Pittsburgh, Pa., stretched out to nearly 7,000 yards, only intimate the demands that will be made upon Jones, Hagen, Cruickshank, Duncan, Ray and others when they gather to throw up some sort of opposition that may, and again may not, break the streak of Jones in annexing with ease all that is good whenever he enters. “The ‘American Golfer,’ commenting on the coming play, asserts that it ‘expects the real winner of the tournament will be General Par, and the official winner the man who can approximate s:ix or seven above perfect figures.” NETWORK OF TRAPS “A network pf more than 200 traps, deep, devilish,* in which the player must be long suffering in the extreme, is strung like a necklace irregularly dotting the course. Each trap is raked with one-inch deep furrows, dispatches say. precluding the use of anything but rnashie niblicks and niblicks. Oakmont will be a nightmare for everybody, for none can hope to escape the threatened mental possibility of getting in them. An ‘off’ day, and it’s the end of hopes clung to during the year. “The short holes, too,” the “Golfer” continues, “are going to give too much trouble for perfect play.” It points out, decrying the over-severity of the layout as it will be played, that “when you are required to get a three on a 353-yard hole, and another on a 226-yard hole, and to do it four times the odds are more than 3 and 1 against. Moreover, the shortness of the other two holes, 172 and 164 yards, is nullified to some extent by the cleverness necessary to manipulate and ‘cash in’ on the slope of the greens.” “A friend recently returning from the East and who visited Oakmont is of the opinion that many will meet their Waterloo on the fourth hole. This is 536 yards in length and calls for a straight drive that must be almost as straight as a rifle shot down the narrow fairway. The drive is from a lofty elevation, which will give a short cut to the green if more than 300 yards. Failure is penalised heavily, too heavily, he thinks, and recovery is irretrievable. "The man who combines a good wood game with rnashie dexterity and putting perfection should win, for length, perfection of shots around 150 yards, and the putting which attends every win of a championship, are what are imperative for low scoring.