GOLF.

Taranaki Daily News, 8 March 1924, Page 12

GOLF.

GENERAL ITEMS. A most interesting item to golfers was the cabled announcement that J. H. Kirkwood, ex-Auistralian open champion, has accepted a permanent position with the Rockwood Club, New York State, at a salary of approximately £2600 a year. Other Australians engaged with clubs in the United States are J. V. East and A. W. East, both fine exponents of the game. Kirkwood’s salary is reported to be £2600 a year, which will be the largest ever paid to a professional golfer in th% United States. I received by the last mail, says an Australian writer, the American Annual Golf Guide for 1923, which gives a list of all the golf clubs in the United States, but no such club is mentioned. The nearest to it is the Rockaway Hunting Club, established in 1878, length 6300 yards, with a 73 par. Il is 20 miles from New York. Visitors charges’: 2 dollars week days, 3 dollars Sundays and holidays. Possibly this is the club that is meant. In any case, Kirkwood is to be warmly congratulated on the fine position that he has obtained. Everyone in- Australia will be delighted. If anyone deserved success, Kirkwood does, for no one could have worked harder at the game than he has, and possibly no one knows more about it, even thougji he may say little. Anyone who can command the great variety of shots that he does, must know practically all that can be known about the method of hitting the ball to obtain the various flights. I trust Kirkwood will be happy in his new position. Three xlustralians now hold positions at clubs in America —J. V. East, A. W. East and J. H. Kirkwoodall of them fine players, with J. V. East a wonderful workman in the fashioning of golf clubs. I can hardly imagine there is a better in the world, though this seems to be saying a great deal. The club referred to might be Rockland County Club, Sparkhill, though it has only nine holes, with a length of 6450 yards. It is 20 miles from the city, but is not given as a New York club.

A remarkable golf drive was recorded during a week-end in mid-November on the Home Park golf course, near Hampton Court. Mr. Kempley, a member, waiting to drive off the sixth tee, hesitated because ahead of him in the rough, about 187 yards away, was Mr. fx. F. Preston, late telephone controller of London. His partner remariced: “You would never hit him in a hundred yards at this distance.” Mr. Kempley drove off and the ball struck Mr. Preston on the elbow. When Mr. Kempley apologised, Mr. Preston said, “I felt something hit me, but I cannot find your ball.” They searched for some time, and- finally found the ball in Mr. Preston’s pocket. * * • • The thirteenth hole on the Wanstead course, Essex, must be the mosi unlucky in the world from the point of view of lost balls. It is a dog-legged hole of 296 yards, played from left to right round a sheet of water known as Finnis’s Pond, which in some places is 30 feet deep. At the point where the the scratch man drives over the lake the carry is 155 yards, but the smallest slice will mean a watery grave, with the ball gone for ever. A hooked shot to avoid the possibility of driving into the pond will land the player into fields

—out of bounds. So at some point or another he must, whether he likes it or not, go over the lake. Safely over, he has then a masliie ehot off sorts to the green. But he had not finished with the lake, for the green is on the very edge of it, and a, timidly hit approach slightly off the “neck,” and another ball has disappeared. In an Essex Golfing Union tournament on November 21 at Wanstead, no fewer than 150 balls were lost in the pond, surely a record for the number of lost balk at one hole in a day’s golf. 1n,1914; the lake was dredged, and over 300(T golf balls were fished up frdm the bed. What awful tragedies these thousands tff balk represent. A n <l. it is. computed that in the nine years that have elapsed since that time another 5000 at least have been drivep intp the lake. In cash alone thefee figures represent a. sum of £lOOO. '

Harry Vardon’s record was twice beaten on the Leatherhead course recently, when the Guildford Alliance decided a 36 holes stroke competition under handicap. In the second round. G. H. Turner (Guildford) returned 71, which beat Vardon’s record by a stroke, and a little later H. Amos, the Bramlfey professional, came in with a 68. This enabled him to win the competition by a stroke from A. E. Scrutton (West Byfleet). It is the opinion of many good judges that E- T. Story, the golf captain of Cambridge University, is a likely winner of the amateur championship in due course; Thus there was considerable curiosity to see how he would perform when meeting Roger Wethered, the present champion, in the match between Cambridge and Worplesdon on the latter’s course near Woking. Wethered was at his very best, and it was no wonder Story went under for the first time this. season. The former did the firwt nine holes in 33 strokes, and finally won by 6 and 5. Story almost held his rival for five holes, being then only 1 down, but trying to do a bit too much led to his missing or marring his tee shots, with the usual result. Wethered had nothing worse than fours on his

card, his score being 34434434433, an£ coming home 4443. Wethered was 12 yards wide of the pin at the eleventh (528 yards), with two shots, and. hi® play throughout was wonderful. Though' the captain lost, th e Cambridge team proved successful.

“Personally,” says Harry Vardon, “I have very litte faith in devices for the improvement of golf clubs which aro introduced from time to time with the

object of simplifying the game for moderate players. Patent-shaped heads or grips, grooved faces to iron clubs, or strange compositions plastered on the faces of wooden clubs—these and other designs for making the shots longer or more accurate, or both, are usually de*« lusions. Often they are downright disadvantages. I pity the average golfer who tried to excel with a grooved mashie-niblick with sharp'edges to the grooves, such as may still be used in the United States, although Britain now bars it. It is essentially a club for a first-class player who can hit th® ball with supreme accuracy; anybody who mistimed the stroke in the slightest degree would make a complete bungle of it.”

“My Christmas present to the golfing multitude,” wrote, a couple of months ago, Walter Hagen, former British champion, “is going to be in the shape of an important tip on the game, that} should help the duffer. Most golfers imagine that a shot is made with tha arms and upper part of the body, and give little concern to the feet and legs. The foundation is everything in golf. If the feet are well planted on tha ground, and fairly well apart, tha golfer is in the correct position to hit the ball. This is where all the power k going to come from, and once settled on a solid basis the player can apply as much force as he likes. If one i$ inclined to toe dance, he is courting trouble. If the feet are close together, one is apt to away off balance. If they are well apart a slight sway will not, materially alter the rhythm. If a< golfer is on both toes at the finish, the chances are that something hai gone wrong with the shot.” »