To start, love and condolences to the family and many friends of Lady Angela Bonallack (above), who has died at the age of 85 after a long illness.  Angela’s golfing heyday started in the 1950s and in 1956, as Angela Ward, before her marriage to Michael Bonallack, she made her debut in the Curtis Cup, at Prince’s and won her singles to help GB and I to a 5-4 victory over the USA

In 1958, at Brae Burn, as Mrs Bonallack (Michael’s knighthood was a few decades away), she won her foursomes with Elizabeth Price and halved her singles with the formidable Barbara McIntire, to more than play her part in a dramatic tie:  4 1/2 – 4 1/2 (36-hole matches in those days).  Then came the 1960s and a very long period of American dominance.  Angela played in 1960, 1962, 1964 and 1966 and kept meeting the Great Gundy, JoAnne Gunderson (later Carner) in the singles.  Unfortunately for Angela, JoAnne, a self-confessed “fire and fall back” belter, loved playing the sweet-swinging Englishwoman because she admired – and absorbed – the rhythm of her opponent and raised her already considerable game to meet the challenge.

Angela, who had four children in between matches, won the English Championship twice, in 1958 and 1963 and reached the final of the British (now officially the Women’s Amateur Championship instead of the Ladies’ British Open Amateur Championship) twice, losing to Marley Spearman in 1962 and Carol Semple in 1974.  Marley, a dancer before she discovered golf, had the utmost admiration for her friend and compatriot:  “I was lucky to play in the time of Angela,” she told Lewine Mair.  “I liked her enormously.  She was a terrific golfer and I had the utmost admiration for her tenacity.”

Bridget Jackson, another great friend and contemporary, has some lovely memories of Angela’s off-course exploits – heading the wrong way up an escalator in Belgium; travelling to events in a caravan with her sister-in-law Sally (Barber, nee Bonallack); having to get out and push an overloaded car and caravan on the way to Harlech; the list is endless and there was always laughter.

Above all, as Bridget said, “Angela was great fun.”

St Andrews next week won’t be quite the same without her – she and Michael made their home in Scotland and she became a member of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club in 2015 when women were admitted as members at long last, so the place was in her blood and she’d have revelled in the 150th celebrations.

An Open at the Old Course is always a treat (though it’s a bugger for spectators) and I’m expecting this year’s edition to be completely bonkers, a wonderful celebration of “the marvellous mania”, as Alistair Cooke called his passion for the game.  Luckily, I was successful in the ballot and secured a ticket – for Tuesday.  It’s so long ago that I’ve forgotten how much it cost and it might take me until Wednesday to work out how to download it.  Think I have to get an app first and start from there, then remember to keep the phone charged and avoid getting mugged.  Some poor soul who had his entire life on his phone was robbed and had the devil’s own job sorting things out as the bruises healed.

For your delectation and delight, here’s another Harold Riley special, also from the 2000 Open, which I came across on my never-ending sorting campaign – it’s one of the reasons I can’t just scoop everything up and lob the lot in the recycling bin!

 

Finally, to change the subject, thanks to Golfweek’s Beth Ann Nichols, indefatigable, well-informed and always readable (the biggest of compliments in my book, just to ensure that there are no doubts) for giving us a thoughtful take from Beth Daniel and Meg Mallon, Hall of Famers both, on the LIV Golf debacle.

It’s easier, they conceded, to look at the bigger picture when you’re many years retired but Daniel still has vivid memories of the time she was blacklisted by the United Nations in the early 1980s for playing in the Sun City Million Dollar Challenge in South Africa (well, Bophuthatswana).

“It ended up being a tremendous learning lesson for me,” she said.  “You can call it naive, ignorance but I didn’t realise going over there the apartheid policies and how it affected the people of that country.  When I went over there and saw some of it, I was mortified by it.  I grew up in the South and what I saw over there was worse than what I saw growing up.”

Armed with that knowledge and experience, Daniel said, if she was still in the prime of her career and offered an invitation (and appearance fee) to compete in Saudi Arabia, she wouldn’t accept because of human rights violations.  “Now that’s easy to say from here,” she admitted.  Still the right choice, though.

And, a laugh to finish, one of my birthday cards, a classic.

Not surprisingly Rory ran out of gas last week playing his fourth consecutive tournament in amongst a hectic schedule of meetings, meetings and more meetings, all with one item on the agenda.  Golf has been centre stage over the last wee while, not necessarily for the reasons many of us like but tour life does go on, for the time being anyway and for some there were ambitions fulfilled and for others dreams dashed.

Haotong Li won in Munich to end almost five years in the wilderness with thoughts of quitting the game never far away.   Xander Schauffele profited from a final hole double bogey by rookie Sahith Theegala and edged home by two shots.  In Gee Chung won her third major while yet again Lexi Thompson was found wanting when holding a lead during the back nine on a championship Sunday.

My spirits unashamedly soared, however, when Padraig Harrington squeaked home by a shot from Steve Stricker to win his first senior major, the US Senior Open.  At 50 years of age Harrington’s thirst for knowledge and improvement is undimmed and he’s proud to have this major title and USGA gold medal to put alongside his other three major wins from his regular tour days.

A six-shot advantage with nine holes to play soon shrank to one ahead with three to play but grit and nerve have never been in short supply as far as the Irishman is concerned.  Three stout closing pars saw the job done and, as ever, Padraig was quick to heap praise on others apart from himself.  Firstly, he recounted how his caddy and brother-in-law Ronan Flood kept his mind from sabotaging him:-

“As tough as the day is coming down the stretch with a one-shot lead he kept reminding me, ‘would you want to be anywhere else?’  The reason I’m on the Champions Tour and the reason I’m out here is I want to win.  I want to win the big events.  I want to win the majors on the Champions Tour.”

Whilst congratulating the USGA (United States Golf Association) on the course set up at Saucon Valley in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, he couldn’t resist a side swipe at LIV Golf who are currently causing such mayhem in the sport.

“The USGA gave us a real test.  It’s fantastic to go there and play real golf.”

And there in those final two words Padraig reveals what he thinks of the LIV Golf Invitational series which, incidently, is currently playing its second event, and first stateside, at Pumpkin Ridge in Portland, Oregon.  Padraig, intent on leaving the sport in a better place for future generations than when he joined the paid ranks is fearful that the opportunity to turn pro, nurture one’s game and develop as a player in one’s home environment will be gone for ever.

“Really I’m distraught about it,” he said.  “For the young guys coming up I just don’t see the pathway any more to get into the top 100, which is what you’ve got to do.  Get into the top 100 and you can play the majors, play the best events and test yourself without necessarily throwing yourself into the deep end.”

Hopefully, Padraig, and indeed all young and aspiring players will have been reassured by this week’s announcement of a strengthened alliance between the DP World Tour and the PGA Tour which, amongst other things, maps out a clear pathway from lower-tier tours to the upper ones.  Importantly, from 2023 onwards, this will include PGA tour cards for the top ten players on the DP World order of merit, in addition to those already exempt.

Padraig has always been about giving others a helping hand and then letting their own hard work give them a chance to shine.  Way back in 2006 I went to do my first ever broadcasting work at a PGA Tour event in New Orleans.  It was the first international sporting event of any description held in the city since Hurricane Katrina had hit in September 2005.

Very green and very unsure of myself I was dispatched on one of the practice days to get a number of interviews with players of my choosing.  I wandered out to the almost deserted practice range and saw a solitary guy working hard at the far end of the range.  As I got closer I realised it was Padraig and I stationed myself at a discreet distance to watch.  At that moment he decided to change clubs and as he turned to his bag he spotted me.

He instantly downed tools, came over and said, “Maureen, what are you doing here?”  I said, “Padraig, I hardly know!”

With that he interrogated me, found out it was my first gig in America and insisted on doing an interview for me right there and then.  He made sure the complicated looking recording device I’d been furnished with was working properly and away he went, waxing lyrical about this and that.  He gave me his time, his attention and, very importantly, validation with the other players who didn’t yet know me at that stage.  And, of course, his insights on the course and the tournament were pure gold for me.

Fourteen months later Harrington won the Open at Carnoustie, the first of three major titles in the space of thirteen months.  It was a truly golden period which heralded a waterfall of success for Irish players in majors.  Anything you can do…………was the mantra amongst the players.

After his US PGA Championship win in 2008 Padraig had a fallow period with no wins for a number of years.  A broadcasting colleague of mine was lamenting that he felt he was finished and stated the Dubliner would never win again on either of the main tours.  Of course, I supported Padraig with both head and heart and a deal was struck for a rather nice bottle of red.  After five years I relented and settled the debt.  Then, lo and behold, in 2015 my countryman triumphed in the Honda Classic in a play-off over Daniel Berger.

Joy all round in the Madill camp and a very nice couple of reds with which to toast the winner – one of the really good guys in the game.  And time now again to raise a glass of something to Padraig.  Slainte!

 

There’s been history made in this sport of ours in the last week and I’m not sure things will ever be the same again.

No, I’m not talking about the LIV Golf Invitational that occurred just outside London last week.  I’m talking about welcoming the first ever female winner on the DP World (formerly the European) Tour.  I’m talking about real golf – proper golf, proper sport.    To be really meaningful to the participants and the fans, sport has to be competitive.

Thankfully, over this never-to-be-forgotten weekend there was an abundance of proper stuff to watch.  We only had to swivel our gaze towards Halmstad Golf Club in Sweden where 78 DP World Tour members and 78 Ladies’ European Tour (LET) members were competing in the co-sanctioned Volvo Car Scandinavian Mixed hosted by Annika Sorenstam and Henrik Stenson.  This is the second iteration of this event – Ireland’s Jonathan Caldwell was crowned the inaugural champion last year.

This time it was the turn of the women to triumph.  A mesmerising display of power and precision from Linn Grant, a pro for a mere 10 months, left such stalwarts as Stenson and Marc Warren floundering nine shots adrift.  It was a dominating performance from beginning to end as she cruised round in a best of the day 64 to finish on 24 under par.

If you hadn’t heard of Grant before this week you will get plenty of opportunity to learn all about her now.  She will be 23 next week and hails from Helsingborg but her Scottish roots and connections run deep.  Her grandfather, Jimmy, lived in Inverness and won the Scottish Boys’ Championship at North Berwick golf club in 1958.  Little did he know then that in later life he would emigrate to Helsingborg and have a son, John, who went on to become a professional golfer, winning seven times on senior tours in Sweden.

When John’s daughter, Linn, was born in 1999 she soon developed the family love for the sport and in 2017 won the British Women’s Amateur Strokeplay Championship at, believe it or not, North Berwick, the very scene of her own granddad’s championship win.

At this stage I have a rather bizarre fact to share.  The Inverness home that Jimmy grew up in, and emigrated from, was next (and still is) occupied by another pedigree golfing family, namely the Stewarts.  Gillian, one of my oldest friends, grew up in the self-same house and went on to become one of Scotland’s finest professionals, winning four LET events including the European Open as an amateur.  Brother Mike is also a very useful player and has carved a career in the game having spent most of his working life with the DP World Tour.

Strange but true.  They often say there must be something in the water – in this case I think it’s more a case of there being something in the bricks and mortar.

Make no mistake, as far as Linn is concerned this will be no flash in the pan.  She has a pedigree amateur record, which includes numerous European titles as well as four wins when playing for Arizona State University. She also rose to the No 2 spot in the women’s amateur world rankings.

And now she has notched her sixth and most significant win since joining the paid ranks.  Under her belt are three minor tour victories, two LET wins and this co-sanctioned triumph which, incidentally, comes with a two-year exemption on the DP World Tour.

Ryder Cup captain and tournament host Stenson was playing in the group ahead of Grant on the final day and commented, “Every time I looked back she was in prime position and just gave herself birdie chance one after another, I would imagine.  So, there wasn’t much I could do against a player like that.”

Tim Barter, veteran broadcaster and commentator for Sky Sports and always worth listening to, summed the week up thus:  “One of the most remarkable performances I’ve seen in all the years I’ve been around the tour.”

Since the Swedes began taking their golf seriously back in the 1980s their approach has always been innovative, inclusive and non-limiting.  They have been leaders in so many different ways and are undoubtedly improving the sport on multiple fronts.

Pity that isn’t the goal of everyone in positions of influence.

 

I am going to concentrate on the women this week – despite the fact that the elite men’s game as we know it may never be the same again after the first of the Saudi-backed, Greg Norman-led LIV Invitational Golf Series.  And what better place to start than with another Australian, the less divisive, newly-minted US Women’s Open champion Minjee Lee?

Effortlessly elegant, with a magical combination of liquid power and a deft touch around the greens, the Aussie has now ascended to No 3 in the world after winning her second major last weekend.  It took her seven years in the paid ranks to win her first major, the Evian Masters, last year and it would be no surprise if the floodgates now opened and her tally mounted.

Lee started the final round three strokes ahead of American Mina Harigae and finished winning by four – plenty of breathing room which afforded her the luxury of three-putting two out of her last three greens.  Such was her dominance around the exacting, beautiful Pine Needles in North Carolina that there were only nine players within eleven shots of the Australian’s total.  Dare I say it was a Tiger-esque performance?

Her younger brother, Si Woo, a member of the DP World Tour, posted the following on his twitter account:-

I love the picture of Min Woo with his serious-looking big sister and it’s so good to see an Australian woman player back near the top of the world rankings.  This sports-mad country has consistently produced a wonderful stream of players, with the occasional sprinkling of global superstars along the way – think Karrie Webb, and if you’re a little older, Jan Stephenson.

Webb, the Wizard of Oz, was the undisputed world No 1 in the days before the rankings were formalised (2006 I think).  For instance, in 2000, she won nine times (Tiger won 11) and topped $2 million in earnings – no pittance in those days.  Her enduring excellence eventually pushed Annika Sorenstam to new heights.  In all, Webb won seven major titles and has been a willing mentor and help to many of her young countrywomen trying to forge their way in the game.  While still at the height of her powers she would invite some of the best amateurs to be her guests at the US Open where they would stay with her and watch and learn throughout the week.  This front-row seat provided invaluable insight for the youngsters into the preparation and focus needed to be successful on the biggest stage of all.

Minjee Lee has benefitted hugely over the years from Webb’s generosity with her time and her knowledge and has put all of that apprenticeship to great use over the last few years.  A superlative ball striker from her early days it was Lee’s holing out that was occasionally sub-standard.  Well, she appears to have that sorted and holing four consecutive putts of around ten feet in the final round last Sunday made her invincible.  If you find yourself anywhere near Muirfield the first week in August I would urge you to find the time to go to the AIG Women’s Open and seek her out.  You’ll be in for a treat.

That staging of the 77th US Women’s Open at Pine Needles also showcased women in another role altogether, one behind the scenes and of vital importance.  This was the second year of a programme to bring volunteer female agronomists in to join and supplement the regular course maintenance crew at a US Women’s Open venue, having started last year at the Olympic Club in San Francisco.  David Fruchte, the course  superintendent at Pine Needles was delighted to have thirty women from all over the US bolster his team for championship week.

“Getting the women for the whole week is just a huge stress release on me and our staff,” Fruchte said. “They’re all so professional. They know where to go and what to do. The first day was a learning period, getting to know the golf course but since then everything has been really, really smooth. You can’t ask for more than that.”

With only 2% of the 19000 members of the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America being female it’s an invaluable opportunity for the women to interconnect and see they are not alone in their industry.  This programme is set to continue next year at Pebble Beach and hopefully more women will realise there’s a fulfilling career available to them in the golf course maintenance business.

Finally, I mentioned the other week that we were in the summer time frame of clubs hosting captains’ days and I just want to mention a couple of clubs of which I’m a member and the fabulous prizes, in my opinion, sourced by the respective ladies’ captains.

Jan Pomfret, this year’s LC at Delamere Forest took the club emblem, the Delamere horn, and the ladies’ centenary trophy of said horn as her inspiration and created a most beautiful brooch as her prize.

Meanwhile Roma English, native of Islandmagee and LC at Royal Portrush, commissioned the making of a wrought iron putter from part of a cart axle found in a quarry near her home.

Congratulations ladies – two wonderfully innovative prizes with special meaning to the captains as well as the lucky winners.

Finally, (again!) it would be remiss of me not to send every best wish to Elaine Ratcliffe and her Curtis Cup team who take on a formidable American side at the iconic venue of Merion over the next three days.  It will be a memorable experience for all those taking part and attending.  Enjoy.