Slow play has become a habit, a bad habit if everyone who condemns it is to be believed and like all bad habits it’s a persistent little bugger, insidious and hard to get rid off, worming its way into our lives until we feel we can’t live without it.  It’s seeped into golf over the years and nowadays a 4-hour round is generally regarded as positively speedy.  There are exceptions but they tend to be last bastions.  What happened to those carefree days – within living memory of some of us who still play – of skipping round in three hours or less?  Of playing three rounds in a day?

Someone said to me recently that the introduction of trolleys was the start of the slippery slope – no, that would be too fast, the slope must be sticky, gooey, glue-like, like wading through molasses – and I pooh-poohed that notion.  But there might be something in it.  The other week I played with someone who carried and I envied him his shortcuts as I manoeuvred my trolley around greens and other obstacles.  So, perhaps we should be blaming Henry Longhurst’s mate Lord Brabazon of Tara, who, I believe, was the first man to use a trolley in this part of the world.  Mind you, I don’t think the Brab, by all accounts a force of nature if ever there was one, ever hung about, ever.

So, perhaps slow play is just an attitude of mind and we amateurs have been affected by the actions of others, the professionals who have nothing else to do but play 18 holes and, whatever their protestations, don’t care how long it takes.  Long gone are the days when pros played 36 holes and still had time to get home and give a few lessons before dark. These days, after endless hours honing their skills on the practice ground, players tend to forget that Golf Is Not A Game Of Perfect (Bob Rotella) and expect perfection.

They’ve taken to playing golf by numbers, joining the dots, forgetting that golf is, in fact, a moving game, that you can make decisions on the move, as you approach the ball, assessing, calculating, factoring in the breeze, whatever, so you’re nearly ready to hit your shot when you reach the ball.  Sadly, the modern way is to start all the calculations when you reach the ball, bringing out the charts, or the measuring gizmos, consulting the caddies, or the stars and eventually, when all the post-discussion, pre-shot routines have been exhausted, hitting the damned ball.  Or not, depending on your level of expertise.

The European Tour, bless them, are trying all sorts of things to make golf more interesting and appealing to a younger audience with a notoriously short attention span.  This week they’ve morphed the Austrian Open into the Shot Clock Masters and, lo, with the prospect of an immediate penalty of one shot for exceeding the designated time, everyone speeded up.   Even notorious mañana merchants like Miguel Angel Jimenez, who likes to open a nice bottle of Rioja before assessing his options, adjusted with alacrity and no apparent dip in performance.  He had a 67, five under par, one shot behind the leader Oscar Lengden of Sweden and breezed round the Diamond Country Club course in under four hours.

Jimenez, who won the Regions Tradition, one of the senior majors, in Alabama last month, said, “It’s been very interesting.  It’s very important that you’re ready to play, if not it will catch you.  That’s the good thing, you are not wasting any time…..It would be nice to have some more time to talk a few words to your caddie but it’s nice, it’s definitely a positive experience.”

Peter Hanson, another Ryder Cupper, who also had a 67, was waxing delighted:  “It’s so nice to play out here.  The golf course is amazing and this format really brings it back to old golf, the way it was when I came out on tour 20 years ago.  We used to have a bit more of this pace.  Everyone was ready to play.  You don’t have to watch the clock, you just have to be ready to play when it’s your turn.  You can’t walk around a putt on the green four times and look in two different books.  You just have to be ready to play and just play golf.”

Every player was on the clock for every shot on every hole – there was a referee with the appropriate technology with every group – and the fastest round of the day was 3 hours 53 minutes compared with the 2018 season average (for a three ball over 18 holes) of 4 hours 48 minutes……..What was that about habits?   The average for the first round was 4 hours 13 minutes and no one was penalised for a bad time.  Wonder how long they’ll all take next week…….

I’m running out of words – even this blog has its limits – but there are three important photos this week.

First, there’s the Moss clan at Buckingham Palace on Wednesday, where Michael, recently retired from keeping things in some sort of order at Portstewart GC, received a gong from Prince Charles.

Next up is part of the photo montage that was the centrepiece of the order of service at the funeral of Angela Davies, wife of Bob (or John, depending on how you knew him).  For years, every November, Angela, Bob, Dai and I used to drive over to Brancaster together for the annual Pat Ward-Thomas Trophy.  Angela was not a golfer but married to a man who followed the careers of Sandy Lyle and Ian Woosnam from their junior days in Shropshire to major triumphs in Augusta, she absorbed it all.  She was a pillar of the local operatic society in Shrewsbury as a performer, choreographer and secretary.  She was a formidable organiser but her real forte was people and we’ll all miss her.

Last but never least, there’s wee Mum, who would have been – well, I won’t say, because she hated people knowing her age; we only found out when she had to apply for a passport and it fell into the wrong hands!  Happy birthday to everybody else who was born on the 8th of June.

Techy, technical stuff has never been my forte; throw data at me and I duck.  For goodness sake, I still don’t know what a buffer zone is, having always assumed it was the most unfathomable of unfathomables, something to do with England batting collapses, Tottenham’s inability to win semi-finals, the Middle East crisis or whatever the modern-day equivalent of the Schleswig-Holstein question is.  Wasn’t it Palmerston who said, in all seriousness, that he was one of only three people who ever understood what that was all about and added, “Two are dead and I have forgot.”  Imagine any prime minister being that honest now.

Anyway, the golfing side of the blog has been neglected because I’ve been wrestling, belatedly as ever, with the implications of the new General Data Protection Regulation, which comes into force today, Friday 25th May 2018.  Quoting from one of the many (and varied) missives received on the subject:  “The GDPR is European Union (EU) legislation that will apply to all EU member states and covers how organisations [and, one has been led to assume, disorganisations like this blog] collect and process their customers’ personal data.  It is designed to increase the control that people have over how their personal data is used and put more responsibility on organisations that process personal data.  Following the UK’s vote to leave the EU, the UK government has confirmed that GDPR will continue to apply to the UK after…” [Insert the B word that I’ll no longer mention and is proving even messier than anticipated.]

Updated privacy policies seem to be part of the deal – although I think it was Amelia Gentleman in The Guardian who brilliantly highlighted how little privacy any of us have in these online, e-centric times – and our opening bid is presented here, with the caveat that we can only hope that the technical bods on our side – WordPress, Green Geeks and associated blog builders/hosters/advisers – can counteract the myriad foreign forces and lone teenage geeks holed up in impenetrable bedrooms who see this blog and its readers as a rich source of invaluable, vital info.

Here goes and please forgive me if there is a lack of legalese:-

Privacy Policy May 2018

Our madillgolf blog stores your email address so that we can send you the blog posts you’ve subscribed to on a Friday morning.  The emails that include one of Maureen’s tips include a link to the madillgolf You Tube videos.

We don’t ask for your name or address, we don’t share or sell the data we have and we do our best to keep everything safe.

If you have any concerns, questions or problems, you can email Patricia or Maureen on madillgolf@gmail.com. 

And if you no longer wish to receive our weekly emails, just click on the unsubscribe button.

Also, as you’ve probably already noticed, we use cookies, which are, apparently, vital to the good health and management of a blog or website and are, we’re assured, sugar-free.

That’s it, hope it’s enough to satisfy the legislation and those of you who’ve ploughed on in the hope of coming across some golfy stuff – the computer, which is almost in its dotage in laptop years, kept wanting to write “goofy”  and who am I to argue with such insight?

On the golf front, I liked Thomas Bjorn’s Ryder Cup vice line-up, announced at Wentworth in the run-up to the BMW PGA Championship.  If the worst comes to the worst in Paris in September (25th-30th), Padraig Harrington and Graeme McDowell should be able to talk the Americans into knots.  Not sure what the Irish for Ole is but am sure Padraig does – and if he doesn’t, he’ll come up with something creatively off the wall.

They’re not quite as big or as manic as the Ryder Cup but the World Amateur Team Championships (WATCs), aka the Espirito Santo (women) and the Eisenhower Trophy (men), are taking place in Ireland this year, for the first time, at Carton House, Maynooth, not far from Dublin (the splendid trophies are in the photo at the top of this blog).  The Espirito is first, from August 29th – September 1st, followed by the Eisenhower, from September 5th – 8th.  Three of Ireland’s finest, Maria Dunne, Paul Dunne and Mary McKenna, were at the 100-day launch this week and this is a great chance to see the world’s best amateurs in action and try predicting who’ll go on to bigger and better things.  Tiger Woods, Sergio Garcia, Rory McIlroy, Jack Nicklaus, Annika Sorentam, Juli Inkster and Suzann Pettersen are just some of the big names who’ve competed at the WATCs.  There’s also the enjoyment of a national team competition, which adds to the excitement and tension.  What’s more, admission is free.

I met my husband at the WATCs so I’m a great fan.

Finally, on an immodest note, my partner and I won the Seniors (no denying that designation) Mixed Open at Whittington Heath yesterday with 40 points.  The count back went to the last three holes, so Mike’s putt for a par 4 on the 17th, which teetered in to the hole on its last gasp, was crucial.  Thank you partner.

 

 

 

I’ve been weary all week and wondering why and then I realised it didn’t need a medic to work it out:  the most brilliant St Patrick’s weekend had taken its toll.  I was recuperating from a wine-tasting triumph at Worth Brothers, based in an ancient wine cellar and one of my top Visit Lichfield attractions; then there was Ireland’s Grand Slam triumph at Twickenham, a masterclass of precision, passion and skill, a team that made sure they secured the prize they craved and deserved; Spurs also beat Swansea to reach the semi-finals of the FA Cup and now play bro-in-law Brian’s Man Utd; Rory made a jaw-dropping late charge to win at Bay Hill and earn an Arnie cardie; no wonder we broke out the birthday Bolly.

Exercise is the perfect antidote to a weekend like that but there was no golf on Monday because of snow and a seriously frozen course, so the final (yes, the final, my partner has dragged us to the final) of the Winter Foursomes had to be re-arranged.  There was no golf on Tuesday because the course was still frozen and some of the paths were dangerously slippery – a few years ago one intrepid soul was persuaded out by his mates and ended up breaking several ribs, so caution is now the name of the game.

We had to console ourselves with the ladies’ captain’s afternoon tea, bring and buy and flower-arranging demo.  It all looked so easy, as anything done by an expert does, then I got home, looked at my flowers and realised that, as so often, I still have a lot to learn.  Good thing I come from a long-lived line.  But, no, I have not added flower arranging to the list of things I’m doing that I can’t do.  Everyone has their limits.  And it’s beginners’ bridge this morning.

It was also a good weekend for Inbee (pesky predictive text turned that into Inbox!) Park, the Olympic champion, who is turning herself into one of the golfing greats.  She blitzed the opposition – in the nicest, most sedate way possible – at the Bank of Hope Founders Cup in Arizona and won by five shots.  The seemingly indestructible Dame Laura Davies shared second place with Ariya Jutanugarn, of Thailand and Marina Alex, of the United States.

Inbee has now moved back into the top ten on the Rolex Women’s World Rankings but she wasn’t too bothered, saying that she hadn’t really paid too much attention since she’d won her gold medal.  She’s been No 1 and says that now she’s concentrating on “just playing some good golf, that just brings little rankings up anyway”.  What a refreshing way to look at things.  She’s competitive, of course but she’s done the No 1 thing, she defied a fair amount of Korean criticism to compete at the Olympics in Rio (she’d been injured) and she exudes an air of calm and control, whatever she may be feeling.  Essentially, now, she plays for the love of the game and the competition.

DLD (Dame Laura Davies) is also a one-off, a talented, free-spirited, stubborn phenom who marches to the beat of her own drum.  That second place was her best LPGA finish since – wait for it – 2007.  I’m pretty sure I read that right – Laura is 54 after all and has been around for a long time.  “Maybe now people will stop asking me when I’m going to retire,” she said.  She puts her longevity down, in part, to limiting her time beating balls on the practice ground; a range rat she was not and she has never been a gym rat either but she’s kept herself fit and strong by being active and doing what she loves and is more than good at.

Ariya J played with the Englishwoman in the last round in Phoenix and the young Thai, who won the Ricoh Women’s British Open at Woburn a couple of years ago, was genuinely chuffed:  “It’s like my dream come true,” she said.  “I love how she plays.  She’s like my idol and I had so much fun.  I didn’t really concentrate on my score at all.  I just had so much fun and it was a pleasure to play with her.”

Karrie Webb, a Queenslander from Australia is another legend, albeit only 43 and the USGA (United States Golf Association) has given her an exemption into this year’s US Women’s Open at Shoal Creek.  That means the Aussie’ll be playing in her 23rd consecutive Open, a testament to her excellence and longevity.  She last won the championship in 2001, successfully defending the title she’d won the year before.  That wasn’t the world’s best bit of scheduling, in fact it’s a candidate for one of the worst, given that it was the same week as the Millennium Open at St Andrews.  If ever a woman was badly served, it was Webb that week.  She might not have noticed as she added another major to her consummate resume but the eyes of the golfing world were not on The Merit Club in Illinois in July 2000.  Somebody called Tiger Woods won at St Andrews.  I still seethe at the crassness of that clash.

And talking of seething, there are a lot of people out there, if my reading of Twitter is correct, furious that Juli Inkster, US Solheim Cup captain, commentator, icon, legend, still player, is out there without a sponsor.  Nothing on her bag, on her shirt, no names nowhere.  Some mistake, surely?  Don’t they know that we older women have influence and money to burn???

 

 

There’s a good deal of chat going around the golfing world at the moment as to how golf can fight its corner in attracting and keeping new players in the face of stiff competition from a plethora of seemingly more exciting and more sexy sports and pastimes.

At grass roots level it is fairly obvious that we in the UK and Ireland can do better at providing an environment appealing to women, children and families, an idea embraced by the Scandinavians for the last three decades.  Too many clubs have been slow to buy into this concept with the result that it is frequently an uphill battle combating dwindling numbers and interest.  With this in mind, I applaud the simplification of the rules, the next version of which comes bounding into play in January 2019.  Taking a couple of penalty shots and dropping the ball near the out-of-bounds fence over which your ball has just sailed is common sense and has been in practice in friendly golf for years.  It is simpler and beats trudging back to the tee and taking a penalty of stroke and distance – and, with a bit of luck, it should keep play moving.  Rules that are easier to understand and implement are obviously one way forward, though this OB rule won’t be used at professional or elite level.

I’m pretty much in favour of most things that make the game easier and therefore more enjoyable for the club golfer.  I most definitely would NOT have banned the anchoring stroke in putting for the club player, who, to a greater or lesser degree, is challenged in terms of skill level anyway.  Many of the players you see with the broomhandles have suffered from the yips and the long putter has kept them playing the game and enjoying it.  Of course, the long putter itself is not actually banned but you cannot have your hand touching your body, a near impossible task in winter golf when swathed in several layers.  This is an easy game not to play – let’s not give anyone any encouragement in that direction.

For the same reasons I would not want to see the club player losing significant distance in their long games because of mooted restrictions on the distance the ball can travel.  It is a great joy to swing one of the frying-pan-head sized drivers and belt the ball a decent distance even when the bus pass is tucked into your hip pocket alongside your scorecard and specs with which to read them both.

The sharp eyed among you will have noted that I make all of the above points with reference to the club player.  I am, however, in favour of different conditions being imposed on those who play the game for a living.  I am a fan of bifurcation (a fancy word to describe having two sets of rules, one for pros and one for amateurs.)  The guardians of our game have oft stated they are completely against bifurcation, citing one of the beauties and unique selling points of golf being that anyone can play any of the great courses that host major championships with the same balls and clubs available to the world’s best. That is a claim that doesn’t bear close scrutiny.  We already have bifurcation.  Higher end equipment played by the tour pros is not available to the public from retailers.  And the aforementioned new option of dropping after hitting it OB is only available to the club golfer.  What is wrong with acknowledging that the pros play a completely different game and on occasion should (as they indeed do) play different rules?

Let’s talk about the professional game now.  It’s our shop window and has the power to attract or repel people into or away from our sport.  The modern game played by supreme male and female athletes has been described by many as a “bomb and gouge” game, i.e. go and smash the ball as far as you can, often leaving only a wedge or short iron to the green.  It’s so much more one dimensional than twenty years ago.  But let’s not blame the pros for the lack of guile and shotmaking in the modern game.  They and their skills have developed in response to the equipment and course set-ups they play week in week out where the premium is on length and not necessarily accuracy.  This has led to courses getting longer and longer, rounds taking longer and longer and costs of maintaining courses soaring to stratospheric heights.  With drives now reaching, and on occasion surpassing, 400 yards it is time to restrict the distance the ball goes.  That way the great courses of the world do not become obsolete and the diminishing skills of strategy and shotmaking can be reintroduced through judicious course set-up.

Furnish the manufacturing companies with specifications for a tournament ball and allow them to come up with their own conforming model which must be played in all professional tournaments – and, I would suggest, perhaps also in amateur championships and International matches.  I don’t forsee any difficulty for elite amateur players – it ‘d be similar to when both the 1.62 inch ball and the 1.68 inch balls were in use and we amateurs switched to the larger one for everything because that was what was required at the elite level.

Leave the club players to enjoy and benefit from technology and introduce a tournament-conforming ball for the pros and elite amateurs.  Is it really so difficult?