GOLF.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume 46, Issue 142022, 27 September 1920, Page 3

GOLF.

THE OVERLAPPING- GRIP,

(By Harry Vardon.)

In golf, the first thing to learn is the proper way of gripping tne club. 1 have known literally hundreds of players whose long-drawn-out agonies of slicing and pulling have been due entirely to wrong methods of holding the club.

When a pupil comes to me to be cured of a fault, 1 ask him first to drive two or three dozen shots in his own manner, so that 1 may take stock of his style. Very remarkable has been the proportion of cases in which stance and swing have been correct, and the sole cause of trouble has been a bad grip. How do you hold the club'? Very likely you take it deeply into the palm of the right hand (with the knuckles of that hand pointing to the ground), and put the left hand into the position that seeihs most comfortable. That is the popular way, because it seems to be the natural way. It is the manner in which you might seize a sledge hammer with which to attack a person of murderous intent.

Evcrvbodv who has devoted serious thought, to the art of golf knows that the two hands must be touching in the grip—if they are only a fraction of an inch apart, one is nearly sure to work against the other —but, for the rest, there is an easy-going faith among thousands of players in the efficiency of the grip that comes most easily. I do not, think that it is justified by results. » THE PALM GRIP. Euless you happen to be such a genurn as Mr John Ball, v be does, indeed, adopt tiiis palm grip, you are liable to slice and pull with perplexing impar-

tiality. To secure straight and long hitting, t-lie first necessity is that the hands shall work in perfect unison, and the second is that they shall hold the club lightly. Neither of these conditions is encouraged by the “pialm-,,l-ip.’’ It is only a degree better than having the hands apart on the club, because the one hand exercises no control over the other, and, therefore, either may assume the mastery at any moment. And 1 am certain, aftei tliiity years ’ close study of golf, that there ou<’ht not to be a master hand; that the two should work in perfect har-

mony to produce the best results. That the “palm-grip”—the club deeply in the palm of the right hand _ promotes a heavy hold of the club is obvious. And you do n6t want to hold the club so that you cannot ‘ ‘ feel' ’ the shot. You should be sensitive to the “feel” of the head of the club all the while. If you are simply flourishing a stick at the ball with a knob of wood at the end of the stick, you are not likely to obtain skilful effects. In my time I have made many shots of gratifying length, and always have I field the club lightly—although not loosely—in my fingers. It is much the same with a billiards player. You

will notice that a champion holds the cue lightly in his fingers for the most forceful shots; it is the bad player who grips the cue as though he were going to poe the fire with it. I am certain that the longest and straifihtest shots in golf are made with a light hold of the club—a finger-hold. The° fingers are sufficiently strong to keep the club in position without overpowering it —as the palm is capable of doing. One of the secrets of success at o-olf is not to force for effects. Time after time have I said to an assiduous pupil: “Don’t make such hard work of it. Hold the club lightly and swing easily.” You can hold lightly and yet maintain perfect control by exercising tfic firmst grip with the thumbs and forefingers. By some strange ordering of Natuie which I do not profess 1o be able to

understand, ihe little fingers ha\e the power to exercise the lightest hold, ‘llust piick up a walking stick and ascertain by gripping with all your might how much more resolute a hold these little members exercise than the bigger fingers and the thumbs. That is a condition which has to be remedied in golf. The grip that seems most natural is not necessarily the best. 1 played comparatively seldom —indeed, caiy during the four public holidays of the year—in my early days in Jersey, and it was when, at the age of -9. that I took to the game as a profession, that I realised I ought first to imp rove my grip. It took twelve months of diligent study to evolve the method which lias served me so well ever since. . As perhaps you know, it is called

the “overlapping grip.” So far as I am aware, Abe Mi V hell and Alexander Herd are the only prominent professionals of the present dry v.lm do not adopt it. Ido question as to wjo originated it has yet To fie settled. 1 am told that both Mr J. G. Lardiay and Mr J. M. Taylor practised it from ooyhood. I knew nothing of that aurinrr my experimentations at Ripon. tyhoover may have been its parent, I have no doubt about its qualifications to be regarded as the perfect grip. THE OVERLAPPING STYLE. There are so many wrong impressions about it —some people thinking that two or three fingers overlap, and

others that the lingers are entwined and interlocked—that I ought, perhaps, to describe it in detail. Take the club in vour left hand, the shaft resting m the top joint of the forefinger. Place the thumb on the uppermost part of the shaft, so as to point in the direction where the maker’s name is engraved on the head of a wooden club. The other fin tiers fall into position naturally.

Now bring the right hand into position and let the ball of the right thumb the rounded protuberance just below the botto.ui point —be placed over the left thumb so that the latter is almost entirely covered. The first three fin<r(,vlL of the right hand close round the shaft, and the little finger is deposited securely on the forefinger of the left. Then the perfect confederacy of the hands is complete. The knuckles should be pointing in opposite directions —those of the left hand towards the intended line of play, and those of the right in the reverse

direction. This grip may take a little time to master, but it is time well spent. It promotes the firm hold with the thumbs and forefingers, and. the lighter hold with the other fingers. And that is the kind of grip essential to long driving; the man who holds the club with such power that the blood runs out of his knuckles constricts all his muscles and never sends the ball far. Moreover, the overlapping grip is in a large degree a preventive of one I hand overpowering the other, and, therefore, of slicing and pulling. MAS TEE-TON CLUB.

A handicap four-ball bogey maich was played on Saturday last at tho Masterton Club’s links. The best cards handed in were as follows: — K. Welch (13) and B. Welch (19),

9 up. T. IT. Horton (ser.) and C. Perry (5),

6 up. J. Kerr (7) and J. H. MeCalden (9), all square.