GOLF

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 20104, 24 March 1928, Page 8

GOLF

BRITISH PROSPECTS OPTIMISTS AND PESSIMISTS. PRACTICE MAKES PERFECTION (Specially written for the 1 Chronicle’ by Harry .Vardon, six times open champion.) What is the outlook for British golf in 1928? There arc pessimists iu the land, partcularly in regard to the professionals, who, being required as instructors rather than gladiators, l£>ld a position in golf which is not quite the same as that wheh prevails in other games.

I iSomebody wrote a Ittle while ago:— [‘•lt is a ghastly and; sickening sight 1 » see the slap-dash methods and the fundamentally incorrect styles of the .rank and file of our young professionals. These are the men w r ho are teaching up and down the country. In their | Lands lies the fashioning of the future players, and many of them appear completely ignorant of the very rudiments of the game. Our young professionals have got to throw off the, cloak of stupid self-satisfaction and begin to learn something about the game, or woe to the future of British

This is far-fetched. There is a ccraiu measure of justification for the criticism, but it ought not be all-em-bracing. Last season’s open championship at St. Aindrcw's brought to the front two players, B. Hodson and T. H. Cotton,

each about 20 years of age, who clearly have thought out the science of the game with diligence. They were the only competitors within striking distance of Mr Bobby Jones at the half-way stage, and they finished high in the list with aggregates below r 300 for the four rounds. Cotton came to the conclusion a year ago that the only factor that retarded Lis progress was weak putting. This onviction settled upon him after two rounds in a scoring competition with George Gadd, who was hard'ly ever inside him up to the green, but who beat him by some fifteen strokes in the day’s putting. Theory and Practice. From that moment. Cotton ikcideid tu study putting, and he has done it by practising for an hour every day on a perfectly flat piece of turf—always putting frepn. the same place anis trying to putt in the same way, so as tu make the action as far as possible automatic. His theory is that the individual who practises from various parts of the green, and over undulations, can never be sure, owing to these distractions. whether he is striking the ball tiuly, whereas he does know when he, is always on the flat and starting from one spot. And, in this latter way, he learns to hit the ball accurately. It sounds toilsome, but it is precisely the spirit that evolved the great British golfers of previous generations, and which has produced the outstanding American golfers of to-day. Moreover, Cotton has worked out a putting grip of his own—the only grip for which lie does not overlap any finger. He has the backs of the hands well under the shaft. That has the natural effect of making the. elbows jut outwards. a condition that seems more Ilian any other to promote, the ideal of swinging the cluli face square to the line of the stroke from beginning to end. Thon there is .Tack Smith, who missed such a wonderful chance of winning the Irish open championship by breaking down in the last round, hut whose • lav will come. These points are worth mentioning as evidence that, the younger British professionals are advancing, oven if they are at the age for sowing the:, wild oats on the links. It is further to the purpose that throe English players who are all in the prime of or.ilv athletic manhood, Aubrey Boomer, Charles TVbiicomhe, and Arthur flavors, finished in the first flight, their totals ranging from 201 to 297. in last season's championship. The Brighter Side. In these circumstances, it is difficult Ito make out a case for the utter dcI gene racy of British golf. If Mr Jone* had been absent from »St. Andrews in July, as he iutendol- to be until the last minute resolve seized him to come over and wipe out the sting of his defeat in the American open championship, we should all have been talking now 7 of a wonderful revival in this |eountry’s play. Nobody could have resisted it with Boomer and the veteran | Ered Robson each achieving an aggregate of 291, equalling the best ever accomplished in any previous British open championship on any course; with Joe Kirkwood. Jim Barnes, William Melilhorn, Larry Nabholtz, and

other distinguished representatives of America left in the rear; and with Hodson and Cotton thrusting themselves to the fore as no two youths of their age have done iu the past. It is a curious reflection that the whole trend of gulfing opinion was changed by the fact that Air Jones decided nt, the eleventh hour to cross the Atlantic and play at St. Andrews. At anv rate, everybody rejoiced that he did. At the same time, it is not without justification that remark has been made upon the slap-dash methods and the fundamentally incorrect styles of certain young players. There is a disposition among them to believe that golf is a game which requires little study; that everything can be d*one by dash and rule of [thumb. Very different, were the masters of a former generation—Air John Ball, Air Ha ©old Hilton, and ATr Robert Afaxwell among amateurs; and Hie leading professionals of that era. They never ceased to realise that golf demanded experimentation and practice. As much as ever does it, rejward those virtues in the age of an easier ball.