Golf Reunited

The better half is off motorbiking all over Europe with pals at the moment so I nipped up to the highlands of Scotland to have a bit of R and R with some longstanding friends of my own.  By happy coincidence the Curtis Cup was being played at the amazing Bel-Air in Los Angeles and Suzanne Cadden, Gillian Stewart and I, all former Curtis Cuppers, had a lovely few evenings glued to the box watching the matches unfold.  Admittedly the eight-hour time difference meant we’d a bit of catching up to do in the mornings but it was a wonderful focal point for the start of our week together.

Ah, the Curtis Cup………the vehicle for so many friendships down the years and the 44th playing last week left me inspired and feeling slightly amazed that I should have even the teensiest connection with this incredible event.  At the heels of the hunt the American team triumphed by 13 points to 7, a comfortable enough looking scoreline on paper, but there was a squeaky hour or two for them during the singles when it looked as if the visitors might just possibly cause an upset of epic proportions.

Seven points to five down with the eight singles to be played, GB and I won the opening two matches to level the score with the remarkable Patience Rhodes overturning a four-hole deficit after seven holes in the top match.  Ever resilient, however, the American team dug in, winning all six remaining matches, three of them on the final green and two on the 17th.

Catriona Matthew, the GB and I captain and Meghan Stasi, the American captain had faced each other in the same roles two years ago at Sunningdale and both were rightly proud of their teams.  This time it was Meghan who wore the biggest smile.

“Cannot describe it.  Just so proud of the girls, their fight all week.  It’s just been so much fun to watch the last couple of years and just so proud of them.  What a day.”

And what a week for Farah O’Keefe who clinched the winning point and became just the fourth player to win all five matches since the event went to a three-day affair back in 2008.  She joins Stacy Lewis, Kristen Gillman and Bronte Law in a very select band and my feeling that she (along with a couple of others) might run out of steam after the gruelling test of a US Women’s Open the previous week was unfounded.

Hats off to them all.

The tentacles of the game reach long and far and sometimes into the most unexpected of places when golf is farthest from your mind.  One of the days of our Highland odyssey saw us visiting the delightful little village of Findhorn and our local guide, i.e. Gillian, took us to a coffee place down by the water’s edge.  It was nice enough for us to sit outside so we sent Gill in to grab the refreshment.  It wasn’t coffee she returned with, however, but one of American golf’s most famous names – Charlie Yates.

Charlie’s father, Charlie senior, was a golfer of note, winning the Amateur Championship at Troon as a 25-year old, beating Rosses Point legend Cecil Ewing in the final.   Charlie also played in and captained his country in the Walker Cup and was a good friend of Bobby Jones.  He was involved with Augusta National Golf Club from its early days and was a long-standing member, an association carried on by Yates junior who told us with some pride that he has attended 64 straight Masters tournaments.

Charlie senior enjoyed a great friendship and rivalry with Cecil, Dad’s idol as a young boy and visited the west of Ireland course on many occasions.  Senior was the low amateur in the Masters on five occasions and I met him first through Patricia and my late brother-in-law Dai when Charlie was the main link for all visiting press to the Masters each year.  Indeed he provided the tickets for my first visit to the Masters back in 1991 – the year wee Welshman Ian Woosnam triumphed.

What an unexpected treat to have an “ordinary” coffee turn into an extraordinary meeting like that – and all because of a shared passion for this ridiculous game.

A few days later one of our famous July club members, Sandra Ross, joined us for a wee jaunt and we decided to drop in on a gem of a nine-hole course called Covesea, pronounced Cow-sea, along the coast.  Not even our local Scots had played it – but what a setting!  Stunning golf in the raw and a welcome to boot from Angela Burnett, who with husband Andy spearheads the whole operation, family built and run.  If I were still playing golf this is the sort of place I would return to time and time again.

Realising at this stage that we were only a few miles away from Lossiemouth, I just had to pop in to the Moray golf club where my paternal grandmother, Helen McIsaac, had been a member in her youth before marrying an Irishman and moving to the west coast of Ireland.  Back in the day she was a six-handicapper – a feat I can hardly imagine with the equipment available to her – and I was chuffed to locate the board declaring she was the 1915 Moray Golf Club Ladies’ Champion.

Dad spent many a boyhood summer golfing in Lossie and staying in the family home there and he’d have been delighted we were enjoying the place under cobalt blue skies and, once out of the wind, lovely temperatures.  I’m grateful the girls indulged me with that visit.

Of course, I’d love to still be playing this game and enjoying a few rounds with friends, discovering and playing new little places like Covesea and not just walking around it.  I have, however, come to realise something on this trip.  It is more than possible to enjoy the richness of this game in different ways – and yes, you can take the girl out of golf after a lifetime of involvement, but you can’t take golf out of the girl.

My fears have proved unfounded.