THE ROYAL AND ANTIENT GAME OF GOLF

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17882, 25 June 1926, Page 3

THE ROYAL AND ANTIENT GAME OF GOLF

TWELVE BALLS LOST IN NOVEL OVERLAND GAME.

FROM MERIVALE TO SHIRLEY IN 57. j Two Christchurch golfers branched j out from the conventionalities of golf J last Sunday morning, and indulged i:i j a little game of their own. The game started at the early hour of 6.45 a.m., and the ball was teed up in the middle <■'■ Rugby Street. Merivale. Both players got beautiful tee shots down the ! “fairway/* and set out after them on 1 their task of playing a three-mile “hole" to the Shirley Links. The objective was the hole at “Old Nick.'* The visibility was very bad on the fust r age of the journey, and while -/’e way led along the streets the adventurers relied on their putters, and so played a low ball. Each shot found a resting place in the gutters, so a “local" rule was made allowing teeing up in the middle of the streets. The average shot carried tor about 200 yards. The fun really began when the pla\*ers forsook the roads and made straight across country. Fences, ditches, long grass and broken ground made a series of bunkers that added great zest to the game. A friend in a motor went ahead and gave the general direction to the players. Twelve balls were lost en route. Shortly before 9 o'clock the winner of this unique match holed out at “Old Nick,” with the surprising score of 57, his. opponent running him close with til. JOTTINGS. The remaining players in the Campbell Cup competition are: A. R. Blank, A. L. Cropp. R. S. Beadel, and the winner of the play-off between J. Dolph and A- L. Macfarlane, who became all square on the eighteenth green last Saturday, this necessitating a deciding round. x L. Pegler annexed the bogey competition at the Harewood Links last week, arriving home with the good score of three up. The junior division resulted in a tie between R. Malcolmson and L. S. Ayres. « Ji Miss Bruce won the play-off of the lie for the Hagley Ladies’ Monthly L.G.U. Medal for May, defeating Mrs R. C. Symes and Mrs Chisnall with the score of 85-10-75. The next round of the Captain’s Trophy at the Shirley Links will be the sixth, and the players that will contest it are G. W. Haverfield, R. H. Campbell, R. J. Hobbs, R W. Morgan. J. H. Earlv and M. H. Godby. The concluding round of the men's foursomes was played at the Richmond Hill Club last Saturday, and the winner? were S. J. Glackin and J. Kempthorne, with 163 for the two rounds. CGMING*"*E VENTS. June 23 —Semi-final of the Campbell Cup. and also the Captain’s Trophy * matches. Christchurch Golf Club. June 26 —First round of the Harding Cup. Avondale Golf Club. June 26—Finals of the Meares Cup and the Hagley Cup, and also a bogey match, Hagley Golf Club. June 2<> —Bogey Handicap, Richmond Hill Golf Club. June 27—Four ball bogey handicap.', Harewood Golf Club. July I—L.G.U. Medal Match, Harewood Ladies' Golf Club. July I —Medal Handicap, Richmond Hill Ladies' Golf Club. July 3—L.G.U. Medal Match, Avondale Ladies’ Golf Club. July 7—L.G.U. Medal Match, Christchurch Ladies’ Golf Club. July S—Open Championship of AmeriOne of the leading golfing critics in the Old Country, states an exchange, attributes the success of American golfers to the fact that they study the essentials of the game, and then create a race of players striving to create the same results by the same methods. Their players are thus all poured out of the same mould, or made to the same pattern, and. on the whole, have a better style than the Britishers. Apparently they all swing their clubs alike, they all putt in the same way, thrusting out the elbow in the line of the swing. Stereotyped golfers they may l>e. but they can certainly deliver the goods. Of course, as far as golf is concerned, it is the results which count, not the method, but if certain methods are found to produce these results more accurately and more consistently. then it may safely be said that these methods are the best. That is why there are certain methods of making a particular stroke. A player may chance to get that stroke if he attempts to play it in another way,

but it is exceedingly doubtful whether he will be able to do it so often or so well as if he were to adopt the stereotyped wav of playing it. And the strange part about the growing American ascendancy is that their methods are based on a swing brought from Scotland in the first place, but it has been adapted to new conditions, and improved until it has been used successfully against the players of its native heath.

Has again given the golfing world ample demonstration of his wonderful prowess. His defeat of Mitchell in the £SOO challenge cup contest, after being four down to that redoubtable player after the first thirty-six holes, was indeed a splendid effort, requiring as it did not only superlative golf, but also that dogged element which is necessary to make an interesting battle of such an uphill game. Hagen is. recognised as the leading American professional, and it is questionable if there is a player anywhere who is his equal as a golfing machine. .. 3 . « The best scoring shot in the game,” says Gene Sarazen, “ is the chip shot. Yet it is one that few have mastered, and even the §tars have their difficulties controlling the shot. The reason for this is the shot is a combination of skill and touch, the most delicate shot in the game. Constant practice is the best means I know for perfecting the shot, and one ought to spend hours chipping up to the pin from various angles off the green. But there are nevertheless certain principles that will help you in playing this shot. In the first place you must stand firmly on both feet with the weight of the body more on the left than on the right foot. The arms must be close to the body, with the hands well below the waist, keeping in mind always the fact that on every shot the left arm should be kept straight when taking the club back; simply turn the right wrist over and the left back. Make this back-swing slow and even, and do not take the club back more than a foot or two. Swinging back too far is one of the reasons many miss the shot, and hurrying the back-swing is another fault. Also be sure you do not in any manner sway your body. The secret of the success of all great golfers is their command ifi the playing of the simple class of shot. . . In no place does the advice “ Play your shots bravely ” require more attention than on the green. “ Never up. never in,” is a sound maxim, neglect of which has lost hundreds of games. Because of the delicate nature of the stroke and the importance of what oftentimes hangs on it, many players' courage and sense of touch desert them, and their putt has been just too short. More balls stop short of the hole than ever go beyond it. Therefore consider that putt a bad one which, however close it. goes, yet stops short of the hole. There is hope for the golfer whose ball goes past the hole, but none for the golfer whose putt is short. Kapi Tareha is apparently in brilliant form at present. Recently at Napier he wanted fives at the last two holes for a 68, but was unfortunate enough to take 8. and 6 respectively, finishing with 72. “ Where the average golfer struggles to find the green with two woods—the driver and the brassie—” says an exchange, “ Tareha easily reaches it with a driver and mashie. His short game and putting are something to envy, too.” I would add, however, that Tareha’s great defect is an attack of nerves, which he has in important and closely contested matches. Here is a definition of golf from Vancouver: “Golf (§ an affliction —the study of two life-times, in which yon may exhaust your salary, but never ! your exclamations. It is a bragging contest, a series of poses calling foi luck, alibis, and * courage to wear knickerbockers. It is a test of temper a trial of cuss-words, a revealer of bow legs. It affords a chance to gamble and act the caveman. Jt means going into bunkers, debt and bush league restaurants, getting away from, church sleep and home-cooking, getting close to insanity, a sweeping away of home ties, a genuine re-creation ’from ver t acity. It is a cure for ambition, ar. j antidote .to*, work. It includes com j panionship with coin, collectors a I ! absent-minded scorers, opportunity foi assault and battery to an opponent It promotes not only physical torture » but is fierce on morals.” Had D. C. Coil ins* a Cambridge Biuc

and New Zealand cricket captain, kept to golf, and eschewed cricket, there is no saying what heights he might not have scaled. His fight with Horton in the final of the Wairarapa championship showed him to possess the qualities that go towards the making of a champion. On a previous occasion he ran the redoubtable Arthur Duncan close. It would seem that he had the worst of the luck on the greens when several of his long putts just missed. Although there was not much between the pair from the tees, Collins drove slightly the longer ball. He showed his grit when he took Horton to the thirty-fifth green after being well down. It is related that the classic, “ How to Play Golf/’ by Harry Vardon, was written from notes contained on one sheet of paper. When Vardon had written so much he had nothing more to say. Someone else supplied the padding requisite to build the instructions contained therein to the size of a book. Harry Sinclair, Australia’s amateur champion, is also a man of few words. When he was in Adelaide, on his way to England to take part in the world's open championship, he was called upon to make a speech at a gathering at which he was being entertained. lie pleaded that such an ordeal was beyond him. “ Tell us how you won the championship,” someone suggested. " Oh, that,” exclaimed Sinclair. “ Well, I iust kept my head down and hit hard ” And that was all they were able to get out. of Sin There was one Miramar man who almost added to the Scottish exports while rushing round eighteen holes in under two hours in order to go on to Athletic Park. His tee-shot at Potiki pitched just short of the pin and struck it a trifle too hard to hole ou. Had the pin been on any other slant than the one it held he would have joined the select band. And the day was favourable, for the attendance was small. ” But it would be just my luck to strike it on an opening day,” he says.