YOUTH IN GOLF

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 671, 24 May 1929, Page 12

YOUTH IN GOLF

AS in other sports, world supremacy at golf is no longer a British tradition. A generation ago. Taylor, Braid. T ardon and Ray were supreme. Today, they and their successors must stand to one side to make way for the sweeping triumphs of a swarm of American invaders. Pre-war traditions have been blown sky-high! In the last nine years, Americans have won six British open championships, and on two other occasions a transplanted Scot and a transplanted Englishman have taken the famous trophy across the Atlantic. At Muirfield this month, Walter Hagen established himself as the greatest open championship contender of modern times with his fourth victory in the famous British classic. The Americans themselves admit that British golf has been greatly weakened since the war by the cream of its professional talent being- lured across the Atlantic to highly-paid positions in the States. But now they are producing their own native-born champions. On top of the successes registered in recent years by Bobby Jones and Walter Hagen comes tlie phenomenal rise of the youthful Horton Smith, who secured the French title from a representative field of Anglo-American contenders. Youth will be served, even in golf. Memories of the famous Tom Morris are revived by this brilliant youngster who celebrated his 21st birthday on Wednesday by a masterly triumph over the pick of the world’s best players. Age and experience have stood Britain in good stead before today. Even yet, its stubborn veterans checked the sweeping run of American successes by an opportune victory in the Ryder Cup series, and' Miss Joyce Wethered came out of retirement to save the day for her English sisters. But Jones and Smith have badly dented the traditional theory that the player of mature experience is the man for a stiff championship tussle. , Intense concentration and a mastery of stroke play is the secret of American success. Rich tournaments provide the professional incentive toward consistent accuracy and the championship temperament, and the leading amateurs subscribe wholeheartedly to the intensive theory., Young Smith himself in the last winter tournament season in America pocketed £4,000 as an earnest of his unfailing consistency week after week on a variety of widelyseparated links. Thus do young champions rise—-and none in more thrilling and brilliant style than this tall youngster on his first trip abroad.