GOLFING STYLE

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 241, 5 July 1919, Page 8

GOLFING STYLE

A NEW DEPARTURE

SHORTENING THE SWING

(By E. Endersby Howard,, in the "Daily Mail.") '■

Students of golfing style who- have watched the leading players in the opening events of the new era detect a. shortening of the swing among champions whoso swings used 10 be very full and free. This change was observed in the. case of Mr. Harold Hilton, in.the'match between women and men at Worplesdon recently. Even with the driver ne was not permitting himself more than a tliree-tjuarter swing, whereas in the old days' his club was wont to drop very nearly if not quiteUo the horizontal behind his head in preparation for the

hit. A similar contraction ot the swing was noticed in the case of Jack While when he took part in the tournament at Umberlcy Heath the other day. The results,' too, were excellent. He had more control over the direction of the shot when driving than ever he possessed in the former period of his golfing career. In fact, it is almost impossible, nowadays to find a prominent player who swings the club with that lullnsss and impressive abandon that marked the methods of practically all the leading men a generation ago and even later.. Mr. (now /Lieutenant-Colonel A... ii. Barry was the last swinger of this type to win n championship.

The Swing Exuberant,

When Mr. Barry pained his amateur championship triumph at Prestwick in IMS' ho mude die ciub-head pursue about as extended and circuitous a track as ever a dashing .young player evolved. It went away in a. flat, movement troui Hip hall until the limit to the length of his arms .would allow it to ?o no 'farther. 'Then nu it went, and down behind hi? hack until it nearly touched tho ground 'again, and forward >ntn such divine frenzy that at Hie finish the ■diaft had virtually entwined itself about his body. His style was the last word in freedom of swinging bit although it served him well in his great .week, ho realised that it militated against complete control over the club and gradually shortened his swing, lie eadip.q professionals have never practised these exuberant of. »%""■ since their salad days. George Buncan has told me that until ho paid Ins first visit lo England (it was. when he took part in the- open championship of 180at Hoylake), he know nothing of the compact, upright swing of which ho has since become so skilful an exponent. He was of the full, free, out-stretch W school that chose the most protracted route po=siblo to the top of the wing, the school to which Mr, Parry used to belong.

Hard's Compromise. Alexander nerd seems to have effected as nice a compromise as anybody between tko old way of making tlio sivuiß flat and long and the modern mothod of rendering it rhythmically compact Ho starts fairly flat. but that, phase of the awing does not. last loupe, and by tho time that, the cluh is half-way back, lie is converting the action into an upright one. A coincidence connected v. itK this pretty piece of adjustment is 'hat fiord can sway without losiriß his balance. Whether anybody could imitate him successfully in'this' mixing and flouting of principles is doubtful. It was the Jersey school of golfers, with Harry Vardon at their head, who introduced the mora upright manner of mvinging-tba short, straightaway track to the top. It must bavo come naturally to Vardon in 'hoso early days when ho made his first cluh by boring a hole with a red-hot poker into a chunk of wood (the apolosry for a bead) and gluing into the cavity a stick from a blaokthorn bush as a substitute for a. shaft. , At any rate he never saw any .rood golfer in Jersey and never had a lesson. His faith in the superiority of Hie upriKbt 'manner of swinging is complete. His idea is briefly tbnt no matter how you start the club, you haye to secure for it a certain position at the top of the swing if it is to he. a| good fiwin", and that perfect control is much more likely to. be maintained if yon proceed straight'to-that position than if vou follow'a rouiiduboul route. Thus, ho argues, the flat beginnim-tho wide wcey of the club which is a characteristic of Hie St. Andrews method—means goilltf a long wa.v round to obtain the same effect us results from tho less ■•urn plicated upright swing. Schools of feoif. Iloylake, in Cheshire, as a nursery of «reat amateur players'; Cirouvillo in Jersey, as the training-ground of so many prominent professionals; Westward llo! m Devonshire, as the |:lace of learning of almost as many well-snown ;.-niatcuis as professionals; St. Andrews, as tho mother-course of the world—these homea of tho game have become famous in two hemispheres as "schools of golf." In point of fact, however, there are only Iwo places that may reasonably ho described as golling schools if by the phrase we aro to understand that oil the prominent players hailing from the courso have characteristics in common. St. Andrews has produced none but flat swingers; Jersey has brought forth only upright swingers. The other places have sent into tlio world of golf an assortment of styles. Never, for instance, have there been many points of similarity in (he. methods of those three famous Hoylako amateur?, Mr. John Ball, Mr.. Harold Hilton, and the late (.Wain John Graham. The last-named probably did mould his methods in no small measure on those of ,M,r. Hilton, and they had one noticeable I rait in common-thai of rising on lo the loos in tho buck swing. T'or tho greater part, however, ('npf-iin Graham's stylo was distinctive—a loose-and yot, not, abandoned swing and a ■ urious, but attractive wriggle of the body as ho took Hie club back.