Our golfing pals in the south of Ireland are champing at the bit -nay, frothing at the mouth, some of them, at still not being allowed back on their golf courses.  So thank goodness they had some homegrown talent to follow from their armchairs last week.

First up was Olivia Mehaffey who, for a large part of the final afternoon, was in with a realistic chance of winning the second edition of the Augusta National Women’s Amateur.  With Brian McKinley, a regular Augusta National Golf Club caddy who had steered Jennifer Kupcho to victory in 2019, at her side Olivia looked very much at home on the rolling green swards of Augusta.  Ultimately she ran out of steam and a double bogey at the 12th meant she missed a play-off by two shots, eventually finishing ninth.  It was a creditable performance and she now joins that very, very exclusive club of players from the Emerald Isle who can say they were in contention for a title over the back nine at Augusta.

Only nine players have made the cut in both editions of the ANWA and while Olivia finished in the middle of the pack last time out this was a very different experience for her.  Playing this iconic course with that level of adrenalin running through you will provide you with an experience money can’t buy and hopefully she will enjoy the benefits of that in the future when she turns professional.  Meanwhile, golf-mad Japan celebrated the victory of their own Tsubasa Kajitana, who recovered from the trauma of a double bogey at the 17th, first of all making and then winning the play-off with America’s Emilia Migliaccio.  It was a good watch.

Switching to watch the women’s professional game provided me with a brand new experience.  An Irish player was at the head of affairs in a major in the early part of the second round!  Leona Maguire was centre stage in the television coverage doing her thing and looking very much at home.  I think this is the first time an Irish woman has led a major.  I know Steph Meadow finished solo third in the 2014 US Women’s Open the week after she turned pro but If memory serves me correctly I don’t believe she actually led at any point.  I’m happy to be corrected on that.

Leona fought like a tiger to keep in touch but lost too much ground in the latter part of the second and then third rounds to mount a serious challenge at the end.  In fact, Steph, her fellow Irish international, closed with a magnificent 67 to best her by a couple of shots and finish in the top 20.

There was no one, however, who could live with the very special and supremely talented Thai sensation Patty Tavatanakit who led from start to finish.  Not even the fast-finishing former world No 1 (and favourite of this blog) Lydia Ko could derail Patty’s inexorable march to her first LPGA win and first major title.  Ko’s performance had Europe’s former Ryder Cup captain Thomas Bjorn taking to social media to urge folk to turn on their TVs to watch the Kiwi.  Nine under par for eleven holes stirred thoughts of a “59 watch”, but an “ordinary” finish of seven pars and one birdie “only” added up to a 62.  It was incredible stuff and testament to all the hard work Ko and her coach Sean Foley have put in.

To avid golf fans Patty T, as she is known, is not a completely new name.  She was a three-time winner on the Symetra Tour in 2019 and coincidentally was the low amateur at that year’s ANA Inspiration.  This was the second occasion in her fledgling rookie year in which she had teed it up in the last group on Sunday.  Last time she blew out early but not this time.  Having led since Thursday and started the final round with a five-shot lead, she avoided looking at leaderboards and so was largely unaware of Lydia’s charge that at one stage got her to within two.  Had the tournament been played out in front of a normal major gallery, it’s likely the attendant, excited buzz through the desert air would have alerted her to Ko’s phenomenal charge.  We’ll never know if that would have thrown her off a little.  As it transpired, she was able to deal with everything the week threw at her and her work with Vision54 coaches Lynn Marriott and Pia Nilsson equipped her with the mental skills to prevail.

Patty looks the real deal in every way.  She hits it miles, is good through the bag and putts beautifully.  Bogey-free in the final round of a major at the age of 21 is impressive and she knows now she can close it out on the biggest stage.  I wonder, just wonder – and I don’t say this lightly – if we in the women’s game are witnessing the arrival of our version of Tiger Woods?  Let the major count begin?

These are exciting times for women’s golf.

The incomparable Inbee Park strolled to her 21st LPGA victory at the Kia Classic last Sunday.  She was expecting to be a little rusty as it was her first competitive play for three months but she opened with a 66 and never looked back, cruising to a five-stroke victory over Lexi Thompson and Amy Olson.  In doing so Park broke the run of three consecutive American victories on the LPGA tour – the Korda sisters, Nelly and Jessica, and Austin Ernst had ascended to the top of the podium in the first hatrick of starts – and at No 2 in the world rankings she looks set to challenge again for her spot in the South Korean Olympic golf team.

With seven majors tucked away in her back pocket and increasingly hampered by injury in the lead up to Rio in 2016 things did not look good for Park.  Despite barely playing in the months before the Games, Park found herself qualified for the team but there were increasing calls for her to stand down and cede her spot to the next in line, her good friend So Yeon Ryu.  This is where we witnessed a little of the ruthless streak required by all winners as Inbee stubbornly refused to bow to outside pressures and she went on to make her debut in the Games in the most unpromising of circumstances.  Four days later we had witnessed one of golf’s great comebacks as Inbee, almost Buddha-like, serenely navigated her way to the gold medal which she had targeted months beforehand.  It has, so far, been the pinnacle of her career.

It’s safe to say that Inbee “gets” the Olympics, something not shared by all professional golfers, particularly the men.  She has long declared that were it not for the Olympics she might not still be playing.  The 32-year old has not hidden her desire for a second gold medal and, despite the ANA Inspiration, the first of the women’s majors, taking place this week, making sure of being in Tokyo is uppermost in her mind.  “I am pretty much eligible for pretty much anything in the game of golf,” said Park.  “Plus, I am defending champion of that event and I’m not qualified. It’s just a very different approach. … It’s getting close. I wouldn’t say I’m safe, but I’m getting close.”

Like all South Korean golfers Inbee has been inspired throughout her career by the legendary Se Ri Pak, whose 1998 wins in the McDonald’s LPGA Championship and the US Women’s Open sparked in her own country a tsunami of interest and investment in golf in general and women’s golf in particular.  That interest hasn’t abated one iota in the last 23 years and there are currently eight Korean players in the top 20 of the Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings.  Competition to be in Japan is fierce but if Inbee’s Kia Classic victory is anything to go by she won’t give up easily on her dream of a second consecutive gold medal.  It makes for a fascinating few months ahead.

This week sees the second edition of the Augusta National Women’s Amateur.  Cancelled last year because of  COVID-19 it has been a long wait for these women, many of whom share the dream of competing in the final round over the famed Augusta National golf course.  Indeed, many have delayed a move to the professional ranks just so they can tee it up this week.  Eighty-two players will play the first 36 holes over neighbouring Champions Retreat in Augusta with the top 30 playing the final 18 holes at Augusta National.  When Fred Ridley, the chairman of Augusta National Golf Club, announced in 2018 that the club intended to stage this new women’s event it was with the stated ambition “to inspire greater interest and participation in the women’s game by creating a new, exciting and rewarding pathway for these players to fulfil their dreams”.

Well, they couldn’t have hoped for a better inaugural event.  Captivating the attention of millions, the final round had everything.  The final pairing of Jennifer Kupcho and Maria Fassi went head to head over the last nine holes, Kupcho battling a severe migraine but somehow finding the resources to be five under for her last six holes and snare victory.  The effervescent Fassi, displaying great sportsmanship and joie de vivre, certainly gives the lie to the old saying that no one remembers who is second.  We were treated to fabulous skills by these two young women who now both play professionally on the LPGA.  I wonder if they realise just how much they have inspired young amateurs who dream of following in their wake?  I’m sure in the next decade or so we’ll hear female champions citing that round of golf as their first exposure to the game.

Augusta National may have been expecting a slow burn of an event with the necessity of a few years of play under their belts before the tournament would grow into itself.  Well, they had a firecracker of a debut and, handled correctly and in that inimitable ANGC way, the trend could well be steeply upward as opposed to gradual.

To round off this week’s musings on women in the game, I’d like to say how pleased I was to see Michelle Wie West take to the competitive fairways in the Kia Classic for the first time since she became a mum.  Patricia and I first saw her as a precocious 14-year old in the Curtis Cup at Formby in 2004.  I had rarely seen a female strike a golf ball as she did and part of me can scarcely believe that seventeen years later she has only a lone major to her name.  Copious injuries alongside growing up in a goldfish bowl with your every move dissected does not make for an easy life and it is impressive how Michelle has always behaved with poise and grace when under fire.  She admitted that when she knew she was going to have a daughter a new goal began to form in her mind.

“That’s when I started to think, ‘You know, I kind of want to (play again). I want to show (my daughter) in real time that I can, that I play golf’. It’s one thing to have her watch YouTube videos. It’s another thing to have her watch me with her own eyes.  Seeing me go out there, work at it hard, and try to lead by example.

“That moment that Tiger had with Charlie [in the PNC Championship], that is the first thing that popped into my mind. That’s been a huge motivation and that’s been a new dream of mine.”

Welcome back, Michelle.  Who needs a sackload of majors to be a winner?

Well, how are all you English-based golfers feeling?  Excited?  Twitchy?  Antsy?  Panicky?  Ready to retire the sticks and continue with whatever it is we’ve all been doing while golf has been off limits?  Champing at the bit to be out there swinging and hitting balls?  I suspect the jigsaw season is coming to an end, what with the clocks changing this weekend and the days getting longer, so an outdoor pursuit should be just what we need.  There’ll be no scrum on our 1st tee at Whittington Heath because we now have a booking system – fastest finger first is the key – but it’ll be novel to root out the clubs, clean the shoes, shave the legs and remember how to drive to the course, let alone drive off a tee.

Lots of people have been taking their daily exercise on the course, walking the holes without stress, not having to worry about where that pesky little white (or yellow or orange) ball is going to go or has gone.  I’ve just done it a couple of times and it’s a delight, the course looking a picture in the spring sunshine and no need to check for wayward shots as you tootle on your merry way.  Perhaps it’s true that a course is wasted on the golfers…

Do you ever have those moments when you get lucky, so lucky that you can’t stop smiling; so lucky that you really can’t quite believe your luck?  Keeping half an eye on the early stages of the WGC-Dell Match Play at Austin Country Club, I thought it was a good time for a Harvey Penick story – the legendary teacher was head professional there for 50 years and his pupils ranged from beginners to major champions like Betsy Rawls, Mickey Wright, Ben Crenshaw and Tom Kite, to name just a few.  One of my favourite Harvey stories features an incisive comment from his wife Helen and I thought I’d better check and get it right.  I picked up my Penick books, opened one of them, The Best of Harvey Penick – and what was the first thing I saw?  Exactly the tale I wanted to tell!  What a rarity!

Over to Harvey (and Bud Shrake, the writer and golf tragic who worked with Harvey on his books):  In our hotel room I was nervously going over my notes for the lecture I was to present in a few hours to a large audience of my peers at a PGA convention.

I was starting to feel a little impressed with myself.  Here I was, a humble growing caddie, about to give a speech on how to teach golf to a room crowded with the best golf teachers in the world.

“Just consider it, Helen,” I said.  “Of all the great teachers, they have chosen me to make this talk.  How many great teachers do you suppose will be there”

My lovely wife looked up from the book she was reading.

“I don’t know how many great teachers will be there, Harvey,” she said.  “But it’s probably one less than you think.”

The anecdote was called “Instant Humility”.

As a young man Harvey fancied himself as a bit of a player but he was lucky enough to be paired with Sam Snead early in his career and that’s when he decided to concentrate on teaching.  It was a decision he – and countless pupils – never regretted.  “Nothing has ever given me greater pleasure than teaching,” he wrote.  “I received as much joy from coaxing a first-time pupil, a woman from Paris, into hitting the ball into the air so that she could go back to France and play golf with her husband as I did from watching the development of all the fine players I have been lucky enough to know.”

Tom Kite, who won the US Open in 1992 at a fiendishly windy Pebble Beach, was in no doubt about Penick’s qualities:  “Harvey’s students always improve and at the same time Harvey improves as a teacher……he says he learns something new about golf every day…..Harvey allows the swing to fit the student – his or her personality…..

“I have never seen him give a group lesson.  To the contrary, he would shoo away any sideline watchers for fear they would overhear something that didn’t apply to their games.  I have never been allowed to watch Ben take a lesson from Harvey, nor has he been allowed to watch me.  Harvey is so careful in choosing what he says that I have often seen him fail to respond to a question until the next day for fear that his answer would be misconstrued.  And I can assure you that every answer he finally did come up with was always, always expressed in a positive way.  Never would Harvey say ‘don’t do that’ but ‘could we try a little of this’.”

That’s why he was asked to give talks to his fellow teaching professionals.

And if you come across a coach or a teacher who is unremittingly critical and negative, excuse yourself politely and go and work with someone else.

Or just read Harvey.  His writings are a distillation of years of work, observation, learning and loving the game:-

“What a beautiful place a golf course is.  From the meanest country pasture to the Pebble Beaches and St Andrews of the world, a golf course is to me a holy ground.  I feel God in the trees and grass and flowers, in the rabbits and birds and the squirrels, in the sky and the water.  I feel that I am home.”

Finally, spot the Lichfield Cathedral spires from Beacon Park as the tree surgeon gets to work.  Not a job for the faint-hearted.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last Friday I was a little late for singing (virtual, so at least I didn’t crash in panting and puffing, all hot and bothered).  At least nobody said, “Late, as usual” with a musical emphasis because they’d probably forgotten that even when I’m on time, I’m always late, not quite sure exactly what a beat is, incapable of coming in when I should, mostly guessing what those squiggles on the page really mean.  You can wing it on Zoom, on mute – keeping your mouth open, for instance, when you run out of breath long before the end of the note.  Everybody knows you’re kidding but they can’t prove it.  Even so, we’re all looking forward to getting together again and being found out for our fraudulent behaviour.

Helen, our lovely teacher, said, mock crossly (she can be tough but she’s hopeless at being fierce), “What time do you call this?”

I unmuted myself:  “Sorry, I’ve just been on a Zoom call with Niall Horan.”

Now, this was true but since I’d been one of dozens, there was no way Niall had noticed that I’d put in an appearance, not least because I didn’t have occasion to say anything.  As it happened that didn’t matter because my semi-boastful exaggeration fell pancake flat.  “Who’s Niall Horan,” said Helen.  “Is he a golfer?”

“He’s with a boy band,” sez I, thinking, should that be ‘was’?  What age do you stop being part of a boy band and, worse, ‘Blimey, which one is it?  Come on, you must know someone beyond The Monkees’.  A little desperate, I blurted out, “He’s got 41 million Twitter followers.”

Fortunately, that seemed to impress everybody (though it’s not easy to tell on Zoom) and, even better, out of the ether, a confident voice said, “One Direction.”  Phew, saved by a clued-up granny.

Now, Niall is a very keen golfer, beyond fanatical really, so much so that he doesn’t just play, he’s trying to change the game, to expand its reach, promoting it madly in every direction (to hell with One, though you can’t knock its influence) through his company Modest! Golf.  He’s already working with the R and A and the latest venture has elevated the ISPS HANDA World Invitational tournament to a new level, a tri-sanctioned event with the European Tour, the LET and the LPGA at Galgorm Castle (and Massereene) in Northern Ireland.  There will be 144 women (half from the LET, half from the LPGA) and 144 men playing for a $2.35 million prize fund, split evenly.  In other words, the women and the men will be competing for two equal purses.  It’s a first for Europe but the format  has worked well at the ISPS HANDA Vic Open in Australia.

Dr Haruhisa Handa, ISPS HANDA founder and chairman, believes in using sport to “unite communities and break down barriers” and said:  “To see the tournament grow to a European Tour and LPGA sanctioned event is a testament to the importance of providing equal playing opportunities for men and women….”  He is also a passionate supporter of blind and disabled golf and has found a soulmate in Horan, who said:  “The message behind the tournament perfectly aligns with Modest! Golf’s ethos of providing opportunities for all and ensuring golf is a game for everyone….”

The dates are July 28th – August 1st, so with a bit of luck there’ll be plenty of spectators and welcome cries of “Quiet please” and “Stand still”  from caddies and players back in action in front of fans on site rather than restricted to neighbouring fields.  Last year, when Galgorm stepped in at the last minute to host the Dubai Duty Free Irish Open, some of the stars of the show were not swinging clubs.

At least Niall is not having to sneak around trying to hide his golf addiction for fear of being scorned by his fans.  In Alice Cooper’s younger days he kept quiet about his love of golf because it wasn’t in keeping with his stage persona as the villainous wild man of rock.  The other week, on Radio 2 of all stations, he revealed that a day or two after his 73rd birthday, he shot 69!!  Let’s hope his fans understand.

Niall’s Twitter followers, mostly young females, will all have heard of golf by now – and as the man himself says, if only a tiny fraction of them become golfers, that’s an awful lot of golfers – but not all golfers have heard of Niall himself.

Later in the day I mentioned my meeting to a friend, a golfer with teenage grandchildren, and my friend said, “Who’s Niall Horan?”

“One Direction,” I said, newly clued up.

“What?  Who?”

I explained about Modest! and added the clincher, “Tyrrell Hatton is one of their men.”

“Who’s Tyrrell Hatton?”

Gulp.  “He’s the world No 5.”  (Probably changed now but correct at the time.)

“Oh.  I thought they made crisps.”

Wasn’t there a judge in the late 1960s, early 1970s who asked, “And just who are The Beatles?”…..

Brendan Lawlor, another of Modest! Golf’s men, will be 24 on the 13th of March and he’s in the middle of walking 10 kilometres a day for 10 days, finishing on the 13th, to raise money for Children’s Health Ireland at Crumlin Hospital, the country’s largest paediatric hospital.  Brendan, who is now one of the world’s leading disability golfers, was born with Ellis-van Creveld syndrome, a bone growth disorder that causes shorter limbs and says:  “If it wasn’t for the amazing staff at Crumlin Hospital, I wouldn’t be here at all….It’s a charity particularly close to my heart….

“I’m aware that it’s a tough time financially for a lot of people and although we’re trying to raise funds, even if people just take part in it, that’s all I really want.  People are at home, many are struggling mentally, a lot of young people don’t have much to do.  I just want to give people a reason to get out and get active….”

So, we still have time to get started.  Let’s get walking.

Finally, I came across this old card and thought it would come in handy – and then a friend sent me a piece quoting Rob Maxfield, chief executive of the PGA, on inclusivity (more kids, ethnic groups and, gasp, women) and mentioning that dread phrase “dress code”……Is that serendipity?