The New Beginning.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLVII, Issue 21, 22 May 1912, Page 9

The New Beginning.

By “The Stymie.” The average golfer, whether he be of those who “play in the frost or the thaw” of a city course in winter, or of those who emulate the winter serenity of the dormouse where golf is concerned, is wont with the return of the spring to cherish fond but usually fallacious hopes of a big improvement in his game. The man who plays in winter expects that the better lies and serener air of the spring will completely rehabilitate “his game,” which during the “off season” has been about as much “off” as it well could be. The man w ho has not played throughout the bad months nourishes the idea tha’t the period of rest will, somehow, have enabled him to forget those ill-habits which produces the tops and sclaffs, the slices and socketings, of the bygone summer. Vain hope! for long after we have forgotten our faults, we discover to our eost tha“t they’ have not forgotten us. That is not to say, ail the same, that their ideas are wholly without foundation. Quite the reverse, and if players would only set the right way to work they ought to be able to make this time the opportunity for improving their play out of all knowledge. Unfortunately, their habit is to begin the season in the same purposeless and happy-go-lucky fashion as they began the previous one, and the vague hope that somehow things will turn out all right this year usually proves a very small and valueless asset when a dividend has to be declared in a Monthly’ Medal round.I have small hesitation in saying that a very large percentage of golfers are conscious, at least at times, of the wish tha't they had the whole game to begin over again. Even quite fair players, . possessing a long and arduously acquired experience of play, often realise that they cannot improve their game ■because they know it too well, and believe. rightly or wrongly, that they would have more chance of attaining ultimately to the glory of a lower handicap if they could be able to begin right from the beginning again. They are. indeed, probably quite wrong in so thinking, for were a fresh beginning possible, it would most likely take them into faults and difficulties, it may nvt be the same as those they at present labour under, but not less irritating or less apt to result In scores <rf vexatious dimensions. Yet the idea suggests the question: How much, and how, can the average golfer hope to improve his game at this season. In the first place, nothing in more ensv, and at the same time nothing is more fallacious. than for the player who has been enjoying a spell of rest, to

imagine that hia reflections during that period, and it may be, tits practice swing, with a cork in the back garden, have revealed unto him this or that minor error of grip, swing, or stance which has been the cause of all his many bad and still more numerous indifferent shots of previous seasons. When a player makes even what seems to him the most radical alteration in some detail of his style, he will usually be astonished, if he cares to take the opinion of all too candid friends, to learn that his swing seems to them to be still the same old sixpence, and even when the alteration is pointed out to them it is ten to one that they’ fail to recognise any change. To the onlooker, at any ra;e, the radical characteristics of his swing are the same as they have always been, and it is too much to hope that thers will be any such miraculous improvement in the results. Besides, it seems reasonable, if the player is going to turn over a new leaf, to ask that he should not attempt any patchwork of his old style. Let him rather start out with Lae idea of seeing that everything is right—and a lesson or two from the club pro. will do more to make sure of this than anything—rather than with the idea of sorting oat one particular error which may or may not be the cause of the mischief. The usual plan of the player who does not consider, has nothing at all to recommend it. If he does not play through the winter it is presumably owing to lack of opportunity, which only the lengthening days can give him again. He falls into the error, however, of delaying the of his season until he can get a complete round, which is usually a match, friendly or otherwise, and in which he is almost certain to fall into all his old faults with a good few new ones thrown in, simply owing to his absurd effort to leap into what he is pleased to consider his true form all at once. He would do far better to remember that long before rhe evenings draw out sufficiently to allow of a full round after business, there is sufficiently long light to allow of desultory, but still very useful practice. This, id any time, is his chance to do a little of that practising of particular strokes which he is so reluctant to waste time on afterwards when it becomes possible to secure a match. Let him take out his driver and half a dozen balls to the first or second tee of an evening. By that time more fortunate players will ail have reached the homeward half of the course, and he can slog away to his hear 's content without disturbing anyone. Other evenings should see him out for practice with his putter. There is nothing which will give him greater confidence when ho starts play again than the knowledge that his work on the greens will not fail him when the ‘time comes. Another point that Is worth remembering is that golf being what it is, the queerest of games, there is always a risk of a player losing nis grip of the very strokes of which he deems himself surest. I have known a player who was remarkably strong with his deck shots, and not a little proud of them, too—perhaps because they formed so bright a contrast with the other departments of his game—go off that most useful club completely during a period of enforced rest and never recover his old-time ability with it. For this reason tho player would be well advised to start the new season by a little practice with the clubs with which tie knows himself to be really proficient, and having got into form with these, then to turn his attention to the clubs of which he is doubtful. There is more than one good reason for this advice. For if he takes

tip the less familiar club first, and acquires a mastery vf it, he runs the risk of dosing all he has acquired, while he is trying to get back hj* form with the other. But, on the other hand, if he plays first into form with the familiar club, he is less likely to Aose it again go quickly. Moreover, it is always an advantage to take the familiar stroke first, since there it offers a much greater chance of immediate success, and the confidence horn of a good start is worth half the battle.

Mixed Bogey Foursomes. With all due deference to the stronger sex, including that venerable gentleman Colonel Bogey, one cannot partake in a merry round of prize competitions under varying conditions without coining to •the conclusion that for exquisite golfing torture mixed foursomes against bogey bear oil* the palm. Yorkshire Post.’* One Way of Playing Stymies. On some of the courses permission is given to lift a ball on the putting greens and free it from any accumulated mud. {The rule is, of course, vicious—but that is neither here nor there, for the moment.) They tell a story of a player •who was confronted with a dead stymie. The ball was lifted, carefully bereft of the few dobs of attached mud. and re z placed Whereupon the player exultantly exclaimed, “ Why. it wasn’t a stymie at all—there’s plenty of room!” . . .and promptly holed. Th? moral, of course, is—play the ball as it lies. Bogey ! As a personal opinion, how can one see pleasure in playing against an opponent who is unaffected by head or side or tail winds, who is dry while his oppo-Us-suffering the discomforts of pourifig rain; who never gets into a bunker never makes a brilliant recovery, never sou ks’ a lung putt—certainly there is no equity in the arrangement. Such a perfectly monotonous person is only fit to adorn the moral of a tale for children or to take bis seat in Elijah’s chariot.— •Mr Anthony Spalding in the “ Manchester Courier.” Golf a la Francaise. “I am off my iron shots is a miserably bald statement as compared with “ Ales coups de fer sunt detraques,” in which there is the true ring of despair. “ Pelouse d’arrivee” is a magnificent equivalent for putting green, and I confess T much prefer the quiet, respectable ” norinale" to that singularly objectionable term “ Bogey.” Again, how glorious a person does the caddie master appear when he is called “chef de cadets;” he could hardly do less than wear a gold laced coat and a cocked hat. > —Mr Bernard Darwin in “ Country Life.” The Bounce of the Ball. It is curious how custom survives. A decade ago. when we were playing with gutta balls, one of the earmarks of a good ball was it resiliency, to test which the ball was bounced. If it was a good “ stutter,” i.e.. a good bouncer, the probabilities were that it was a good ball, more especially if it floated pretty high in water (all guttas floated). Now this quality in a gutta ball, a virtue in itself, is mure or less likely to be an absolute vice in a rubber-core. Balls that bounce high are not necessarily capable of being driven relatively further. Frequently the opposite is the case. One need only take a pure rubber ball for comparison. It will bounce very much higher than any rubber-core, biit it cannot possibly be driven anything like the same distante. The bounce of a ball is » criterion as to iCs playing qualities.