Who knows where the expression “Gordon Bennett” came from?  It indicates mild surprise, astonishment even annoyance and according to my trusty Chambers probably comes from James Gordon Bennett (1743-1827), a US journalist.  Sadly, the explanation goes no further, so, really, we’re none the wiser and more research is required.  Suffice to say, though, it means that the admirable Sarah Bennett, just announced as the next PGA captain, successor to Bernard Gallacher, has always been Gordon to me.

The nickname is lacking in imagination but the appointment is not.  It’s quite, quite brilliant.

Bennett, head teaching professional at Three Rivers Golf & Country Club near Chelmsford and a Fellow of the PGA, was astonished when she was asked to take on the role.  “It was a complete and utter bolt out of the blue,” she said.  “It’s not something that’s remotely on your radar.  I kept thinking, ‘Really?  Really?  Is that right?’  I was stunned but I am extremely honoured, humbled and immensely proud to captain this historic association.”

It was more than 100 years before the PGA, founded in 1901, appointed a woman as captain (in 2005), the late, much loved, much missed Beverley Lewis, an Essex girl like Bennett.  “It means so much to me following in the footsteps of my role model Bev,”  Bennett said.  “If it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t be where I am today.  She used to coach me in her garden when I was 15 and we used to discuss my swing in her kitchen.  I really tested her knowledge!  She was always there for me as a mentor and friend, offering advice, support and encouragement during my career and my illness.”

The illness, a severe form of vestibular impairment, which affects the inner ear, meant that Bennett was bedridden for nearly three months in 2005 and couldn’t work for nearly five years.  She lost 95 per cent of her balance and was told she wouldn’t play golf again.  “It was pretty grim,” she said.  “I still have it but I just deal with it.  I kind of know when it’s coming.”

Bear in mind that this blog is not in the least bit medical but I think that Sarah is more of a Blimey O’Reilly than a Gordon Bennett when it comes to her recovery, a bit of a medical miracle from the sound of it.  She went through the sort of rehab that soldiers who’ve suffered severe head injuries and head trauma go through, exercising three to four hours a day “wearing a hole in the carpet” and eventually becoming involved in the Golf Fore Recovery initiative, using golf to help wounded and sick members of the Armed Forces.  She’s also involved in Canine Partners and has raised more than £20,000 to fund research into thymic carcinoma, a rare form of cancer that killed her close friend Wendy Lodder.

How on earth did she cope with it all?

“I’m a bit tenacious and gritty – not stubborn, no, I will admit when I’m wrong but I don’t give up.  And I love what I do.”

In the blog’s humble opinion, the PGA couldn’t have made a better choice.

The U.S. Open is under way on the West Course at Winged Foot in Mamaroneck, New York and I have to say I’m glad I’m not one of the ball spotters.  The rough is brutal, not long (and apparently an inch shorter on day one than it was during the practice rounds) but thick and all-consuming, gobbling up golf balls like some voracious predator in an Attenborough wildlife doc.  The spotters did their job well because I didn’t hear of anyone losing a ball, not even Phil Mickelson, who scarcely found a fairway on a calamitous day.  Safe to say, he’ll not be breaking his U.S. Open duck this year.

Really I just wanted an excuse to use this photograph from early in the week, showing just how hard it was to extricate your ball if you were a bit wayward.

Winged Foot is tough but at least its 18th hole is not disfigured by an ill-conceived backstop in a show-stopping shade of blue, an excrescence that played a far-too-prominent part in the ANA Inspiration at Mission Hills in Rancho Mirage, California, last week.  My understanding is that it was constructed to compensate for the lack of the grandstand that’s usually there behind the green and prevent balls from rolling into the water on the other side.  I think it was Laura Davies, commenting on television, who said that she’d always thought the grandstand should be on stilts, so that the water beyond the green would come into play, as it was designed to.

Of course, players going for the par 5 in two used the backstop as a failsafe, knowing they’d get a free drop and Mirim Lee, the eventual champion, did just that, then chipped in for the eagle 3 that secured her a place in a play-off with Nelly Korda and Brooke Henderson.  Lee and Henderson used the backstop again in the play-off, as they were entitled to but, really, when you think about it, the hole had been emasculated.  On the plus side, it kept the rulings and the drops relatively simple.

Couldn’t find a decent, useable photo of the blue advertising hoarding but here’s a remembrance of Dinahs past.

And, finally, some photographs from the archives, simply because I came across them, of the Curtis Cup at Western Gailes in 1972.  Belle Robertson, on the right, has put her partner Diane Frearson (nee Robb, now Bailey) in the sand but notice what Diane is doing after extricating the ball:  she is smoothing out her footprints.  This was in the days before rakes, so will today’s inconsiderate trampers, too young to remember such privations, please take note…..

 

…..and learn.  PLEASE.

 

Well, so much for my September resolution of getting the blog done and dusted early, well before the wee, small hours.  I put it down not just to being a lazy, prevaricating git but to being a bit depressed after virtual choir.  Singing with other people is meant to be one of the best, most uplifting, endorphin-enhancing activities, good for us on every level….and so it is, usually; even for me, a novice striving to overcome nearly 60 years of standing at the back and miming.

The more uncharitable of my family and friends – the ones with half an ear – suggest that I should still be standing at the back and miming after several years of failing to hit a note with a group of amazingly tolerant, forgiving people, most of whom hit the right notes with impressive regularity.  Dai, who could sing, roared in agony whenever I ventured a warble in the shower and we ended up in kinks laughing the one time he tried to get me started and I couldn’t even manage doh.   The sopranos are safe from me but I now apologise unreservedly to the men and women lower down the scale, the poor souls within earshot.  And to the sainted Helen, our leader, who managed not to wince at my efforts in the days when we could all get together in the same space.

We’re all on mute when we sing together via Zoom – even the best sound cacophonous otherwise, so there are still some technological frontiers to cross.  At the end of yesterday’s session, when we were singing Morecambe and Wise’s ‘Bring Me Sunshine’ (composed by Arthur Kent, lyrics by Sylvia Dee), I made one of my dafter decisions:  I picked up the phone and switched on the voice recorder, just to check how far I was from my first recording contract.  Then, pushing the outer edges of daftness, I replayed the recording….

If I had any sense – which, patently, I don’t – I’d have ended the blog there and gone to bed to nurse my shattered aspirations and get a decent night’s sleep.  But then I’d have had to face the fact that there’d been no mention of golf at all…

And there was plenty of memorable golf early in the week, albeit at a more lowly level than the ANA Inspiration, the second women’s major of this disrupted season, which got under way yesterday in the searing heat of the Californian desert at Mission Hills Golf Club. A travelling band (of golfers) from Llangollen Golf Club (plus one interloper from WHGC) endured much wetter conditions at Pleasington on Monday, although we set off well fed after being treated to our lunch by the club president, a gesture of hospitality that was above and beyond the call of duty.  Many thanks, Michael.  Mo’s back was playing up, so she didn’t play, which, given the near relentless rain, was a wise decision.

Pleasington, near Blackburn, goes beyond undulating and would take a lot of playing in the dry with a bit of run on the ball but we made it round – my highlight was avoiding what would have been a very expensive hole-in-one by 12 inches – then headed off for a night in Blackpool, at the Imperial Hotel, my first non-family stayaway in months.  The famous Illuminations had been switched on a few days before but it was still raining, so I nipped outside for a quick glance then scuttled back inside, masked up.  Lucky we weren’t booked in for next Monday when, from the sound of it, parties of more than six will be illegal.

On Tuesday, we played St Annes Old Links, not quite in the shadow of the Tower but not so far from it.  Plenty of linksy humps and hollows, no hills to speak of and no rain but no pushover, with bunkers, bunkers everywhere.  If you want to score at St Annes, you HAVE to avoid the sand.  I played the wrong club short of the bunkers guarding the 2nd green and the ball ran unerringly into the middle pot.  Three attempted extrications later I conceded defeat, picked up and our designated raker set to work, fearing a very long day.  In fact, after an initial flurry, she had a long, sand-free period before making up for it at the short 16th, one of the many greens  surrounded by bunkers, where all but one of us hit the beach.

It was late when we finished, so we headed off for fish and chips at the justly renowned Whelans and then had a pavement presentation that verged on the bizarre but was the perfect end to a memorable trip.  Thanks to everyone for the laughs and the photos.

The same day, at Kedleston Park in Derby, Scotland’s Heather MacRae successfully defended her WPGA Championship title, posting a 36-hole total of 145, three under par, one shot ahead of Keely Chiericato, champion in 2018 and two ahead of former British and US Women’s Open champion Alison Nicholas MBE.  A few days after last year’s championship MacRae underwent surgery for cervical cancer and, what with recuperation and lockdown, could be described as seriously undergolfed.  Heaven help the rest when she’s in full competitive flow…..

 

 

 

A few weeks ago I began to conduct a bit of a random straw poll amongst my friends and fellow club members.  I asked one question:   “If you could have information about one facet of the game that would help you improve, what would you choose?”

I was surprised, but hugely heartened, by the answer.  Overwhelmingly, players wanted to know more about the mental skills side of the game and how to make the most of the technical skills they already possessed.  Humans are strange beings, though, and although a handful had attended a group mental skills session no one had sought out an individual lesson to furnish them with the information they sought!

Over the years I was fortunate enough to work with a couple of specialists in this mental skills arena and when I was playing my best I was certainly very sharp in my thinking on the golf course.  Two decades of playing only four or five times a year, however, inevitably led to a steep decline in my mental acuity.  After all, if you have a skill and don’t use it, you lose it.  When I joined Delamere Forest Golf Club three or four years ago with the intention of playing more again, I fell into the trap of golfers the world over – I pretty much spent my time thinking of my physical skills.  The penny dropped eventually that I was focusing far too much on HOW I WAS SWINGING the golf club and not on PLAYING GOLF.  I had certainly misplaced my good habits of thinking on the course so it was time to reacquaint myself with them.

Firstly I had to remind myself that I have different areas of my brain at my disposal –  the thinking/analytical side and the intuitive side.  On the golf course you need the former to assess the lie, the yardage, the conditions, the club selection and your strategy.  This is also the side of your brain you mostly need when grooving a new feel or action on the range.  I have rediscovered that it is not in the least bit helpful to have this part of the brain taking over or being at the forefront as you hit your shots on the course.  That is the time to turn the responsibility over to your intuitive side and pull the trigger.

Many’s the time I have had the pleasure of interviewing the top players immediately after they have won a championship or shot a record low round.  When asked what they were thinking during this exemplary sporting performance, the answer is invariably the same:   “Er, nothing really.”  In other words, once they formulated in their minds the shot they wanted to play they then played intuitively.  This is very much within YOUR compass despite any reservations you may have.  After all, you do not give yourself a whole host of technical instructions as you walk, drive a car or brush your teeth.  You “know” how to do it and will accomplish the task better free from the interference of a stream of instructions.

Let me make it quite clear here that thinking correctly on the course won’t suddenly turn you into the best player on the planet.  It won’t suddenly magic up technical skills you do not possess.  What it will do is help you create a platform for producing the best golf of which you are capable.  That doesn’t mean you will always manage it – but you are increasing the percentages in your favour.

So, once you’ve made your decisions re the shot what then ARE you supposed to have in your mind as you swing the club?

I like to imagine I have a private movie screen in my head and on it, in glorious technicolour, I see the shot I want to play.  The colours are vibrant, I can frequently smell the newly-cut grass and I can hear the birds tweeting.  I flood my mind with a picture of the way I want to see the shot fly to my target and I keep that there throughout the swing, all the while feeling a lovely rhythm in my body.  This works for me.  As my mind is busy with this picture there is no room for negativity.  Remember, also, your body will do its very best to reproduce the picture in your mind.  This is why set-up and aim are so important.  If you mistakenly keep lining up left of target, your swing will change to shove the ball to the right because you instinctively know that’s where the target is.  This is why as you walk in behind the ball it’s an important part of the process to concentrate on your aim and set-up and after that turn your brain over to pictures, feelings and sensations.  Then pull the trigger.  Isn’t that more than enough to think about each time?

So, you see, it’s not a case of emptying your mind.  It’s more cultivating the right sort of thinking that will be helpful to you and clear away the interference of endless instructions to self.  This is not even scratching the surface of the topic but it is worth working to acquire better habits of thinking.

Here’s one final little exercise to help you and one that is fun to do on the course.  I call it “Keep Away From The Anyways”.  An “anyway” is any shot you hit when you shouldn’t have.  For example, say you’re caught between a 6-iron and a 7-iron and you elect to go with the 7, but then as you are over the ball you feel the wind freshen into you.  You think to yourself you might now need a 6 – but you carry on and hit the 7 anyway.  Mostly it won’t turn out well.

Another “anyway” is when you miss a green and carry your wedge and putter over only to discover you’d really like to play an 8-iron run up…..but you’re too lazy to go and get the right club, so you hit it anyway.  We’ve all done it.  You may feel uncomfortable in your stance but you’re conscious of the group behind you waiting……….so you hit it anyway.  You get the picture.

This is all interfering with correct thinking skills.  So, next time you go out just notice and mark on your card any time you commit an “anyway”.  Increasing awareness will help you catch yourself before committing an “anyway” and you’ll become stronger, more  focused and attain better results.

Have fun with it!