GOLF NOTES

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 74, Issue 111, 13 May 1931, Page 4

GOLF NOTES

By

"SEAVIEW.")

Th >ugii the weather last Saturday was not such that tho full enjoyment could be obtained from a day spent in the open by golfers, some good play was provided at the various links. In some instances players were able to advance club competitions » further step, and already golfers appear to be fairly well forward with the season’s programme. Balmont Bits. Imluy Cup play has engaged the attention of Wanganui Club members, some of whom have played their second round. However, there are others who have not completed tho first round and it is ol vious that the committee will have to take steps to impress on members the importance of getting these matches played in time. Owing to the races next Saturday a bogey match will bo staged, a n d the following Saturday the first qualifying round of the championship will be played, to be followed a week later by the second qualifying round. The first challenge of the season for the Wilson Cup, held by the Wanganui Club, has been received from Manawatu and will probably take place on June 27. which is the first vacant date available. A novel match set down to be played at Belmont in a couple of months’ time is that in which lefthanded players will be pitted against right-handed players. Last year’s match on these lines was much enjoyed. Castlecliff Chips. Castlecliff players have enjoyed fairly good weather for play during the past week but the wind was rather cold on Saturday and that was not in favour of gool scores. Still, many will recaJ the conditions under which golf was played at Belmont on tho occasion of the New Zealand championships a couple of years ago, and it behoves the most enthusiastic to be prepared for all weather. A young playe r in S. Clarke recently went round the Castlecliff course in 78, while another, W. Tustin, took only one stroke more. This s very pleasing indeed and before the season progresses much further even those figures may be improved upon. A. J. Shaw played a round with L. Cathro during the past week and returned a card of 71, which is one of the best that has been seen at the Cas-le-cliff course. Shaw was playing in his best form and Cathro also was going fairly well, though he was evidently not out to make record figures. The Castlecliff Club has as yet no Nathan Cup engagements to fulfil, but it is anticipated that there will be two or three challenges in before long. Seafield Shots. The fairways at Seafield are in wonderfully good order with a wonderfully good sole of grass that gives one a chance with brassie or spoon. The greens are improving each week, and with each cutting the surface shows improvement. A little later the approaches will be cut further back and this will be welcomed by all players. The roughs are rapidly disappearing and will soon be a trouble of the past. The card handed in by J. Goss last Saturday in the first qualifying round of the club championship was a really good one, and this player promises to be in the first flight again during the season. The second qualifying round will be played next Saturday week, the races intervening this week. Then there is the inter-club match with Castlecliff on Saturday, May 30, the seniors paying a visit to the Castlecliff links and tho juniors playing the Castlecliff juniors Ft Seafield. One of the outstanding elf iits at, Seafield over the week, end was the 75 of A. J. Shaw, which equals the standard scratch score for the Scafie’d course. A word of advice passed on to the writer by one of the older players is well worth passing on in turn. “You must not find a golf ball until it stops rolling,” he says. Paekakariki Club. The Paekakariki Golf Club, it is stated, is again feeling the disadvantage of tho advantage of being near both a railway station and a well-sur-faced main road. Always popular by reason of its ideal, knolly country, and more attractive because of recent course improvements, Paekakariki members are finding it hard to get an uninterrupted game themselves, and have had to insist that visitors must be members of clubs affiliated with the: New Zealand Golf Association, and be 1 introduced by a member, one only per day per member. Oamaru’B Art Union Course. “I have ha'd a few rounds at Oaraaru,” writes a Christchurch golfer, “and can recommend the course as ■ the most sporting imaginable. One requires a combination of Bobby Jones, Richard Cocur do Lion, additions of mountain goat sure-footednoss and climbing ability, and Martian stamina. Such a hybrid product would probably give bogey a decent game if receiving two strokes per hole. The mental hazards are fearful, and are unfair to deep thinkers, whereas the village rustic sends his ball soaring across pond, ditch, and quagmire, bouncing it on some footbridge to get a kick towards the green. But oh! many of the fairways are along gullies, and there arc numerous corners around which polished players may slice and find the green. ” Kirk-Windeyer Cup. Regrettable though it is that the Kirk-Windeyer Cup will not be contested this year, New Zealand will be able to sort out a better team next year in all probability than would have been available now. Most of the best mon in the old team could not have made the trip. With the lapse of another season the eligibility of some of the older players will bo Jess in question, ami perhaps the season ’s play will prove that some of the more brilliant youngsters have crystallised into permanently good form. The New South Wales State championship, on June 15, will nevertheless be anxiously watched by New Zealand golfers to study the form of the Australians so well known hero. Ryder Cup Team. Ret erring to the chances of Britain and Unitefl States in the Ryder Cup match, J. 11. Taylor, five times open champion, writes in the News of the World:—“I am bound to say that the position is as inte'csting as it. is disquieting when one considers the level of the opposition our men will be up .•against in the Ryder Cup contest at Scioto, Ohio, next June. This is not meant as an intimidating or frightening article, but rather as a means whereby our chosen team may he urged to do their best during the next few months Io bring themselves up tu the best possible shape to meet; the

i challenge. The *mc aspect that tends to bewilder is the numbci of new playI ers who seem (o bob up from nowhere and arc able to b.dd their own with the i old stalwarts, Huger, Sarazen an i [others. The sea-» r is in full cry over there, and multitudes of professionals I arc chasing the dollars giverx by promoters in California, Mexico and Florida. “I have kept in close touch wi’b the advance of American golf since my first visit there in 1900, when Harry Varrloi. beat me in the American Open by a couple of strokes at. Wheaton, reu' Chicago, and where, incidenially. 1 first struck a rubber-cored ball. 1 ‘h.n.c I am safe in saving that in ’.Lose d: ys there were no American proleiuunals. but the field was represented by ’be vanguard of Scottish professionals, who truly laid th-i foumjation rd’ American golf. H 1 .’«hv s ’'ir- sir.i; pe '(.» realise, consile-iug tin quaiily <»t H-e opposition, that onlv \ u:d »;i <.n*L 1 wcic considered to bo ’'■ the run..’ng fur the cup. True we possessed whatever prestige or advantage it. may have conferred of being British champions, but when it is considered that we had Dave Bell, who finished third, Tom Hutchison (an elder brother of Jock), Nipper Campbell, Alick and Willie Smith. Willie Anderson, and the. Fowlis brothers, it now appears that our supporters were over-sanguine. All of them were bred and learnt their golf on celebrated Scottish links, and iu my preliminary rounds with one or other of them I am bound to confess that the prospect of either Vardon or I winning seemed as rcmolc as our distance was from home.

I do not think the Scottish missionaries at that time had the slightest idea of the ultimate extent of the fire they had set alight. Golf in those days had only a lukewarm hold on the American public, but anyone with vision could even then foretell that, the game would spread as a forest blaze. Comment is being made upon the haste the American P.G.A. Selection Committee has shown in allowing two places in the team to be filled. It is even hinted that the selection of Horton Smith was unwisely premature, seeing that he has done little to justify himself for three years. Here is a curiousand debatable point, for it is suggested that the shortness of Smith’s back-swing is the cause of his lack of progress. It would appear that if an American professional does not exhibit the full grooved swing there is something wrong—a hint that makes me hang my head in shame. Brevities. Putting is the winning shot of golf; he bold and go courageously for the hole; timidity is the curse of putting.— George Greenwood. Control in the fingers, and freedom everywhere else—that is the doctrine. — E. Jones. 1 ‘Expensive golf balls are going,” says a sports outfitter. Four of ours went last week-end. In putting, the eye, the ball and the hole should undoubtedly be in the same plane, and that plane at right angles to the horizon.—P. A. Vaile. My cure for socketing is this: “Shove the club from the left shoulder, and get the blade of the club open.”— G. Duncan. Duffer: ‘I suppose after all there are worse players in the world.” Caddie: “Certaintly, sir, but they stop in the club house and play bridge.” For brassie shots remember to take the club back slowly and close to the ground, and look very intently at the dimple at the back of the ball. —C. J. 11. Tolley. The left hand should be regarded as the master in the swing. The right hand provides the punch, but if the left is ignored the right gets in too soon.— Bobby Jones. Whatever we may do in the golf swing there should be no feeling of being tied up or cramped at the top. The player should feel able to swing the club round.—Abe Mitchell. Always take a stronger club than you think you should, and play an easy controlled shot with it. Full shots tire, and all your strength is wanted at the finish.—C. J. H. Tolley. Novice: “How many have 1 taken, boy. Is it 15 or .16?” Disgusted caddied: “I dinna. ken. It’s no caddie ye need—it’s a bil-liards-marker.” Sir Alfred Mays-Smith, who died in February, was a prominent figure in London golf for 40 years. He was a scratch player at the R.A.C., Epsora. Surbiton, and Home Park clubs, and for several years past took part in the Veterans’ Championship. Len Nettlefold, the Australian amateur champion of 1928, intends competing tho forthcoming amateur champion ship at Westword Ho. At Hoylake, 1928, he was beaten in the sixth round by Dr. Tweddell, the ultimate winner. Nettlefold is a left handed golfer. Many wise heads look out for the opportunity, when bunkered near the green, or running their balls out nnd up to the pin with putter. It is simple to do when tho bunker has no ‘lip,” but there are some who hold that the practice is not golf, and manfully take tho niblick on all occasions, but a golfer must piay the game, and the game is to score as well as possible. Russley have got over the difficulty by leaving from a foot to six inches of vertical bank at the top of the bunker, effectively baulking tho would-be wieldcr of the putter. Few people knew what Bobby Jones’ middle name was until the. American golfer was recently awarded the Sullivan memorial medal, given annually to the athlete who “by his performance and example and influence as an amateur and a man has done most during ! the past year to advance tho cause of sportsmanship.” When the champion’s name was listed head of the .150 submissions it was seen that it, was Robert Tyro Jones. The man from Georgia got double tho number of votes scored by the next competitor, while even the well-advertised Helen Wills-Moody was well down. Many consider that all golfers are eccentric, but one Raljih Kennedy is unique in respect of the form his mania takes. Ho “collects” golf courses—that is. he is continually raking the world for new courses, and, lia\in ,r found one, plays on it and makes for another, his card being attested by the professional at each club. To date he has cards for 775 courses scattered about the U.S.A.. Cuba, Panama, Ecua dor and Peru. 'l'his coming season he proposes to extend hi« collection by visiting Europe