MAN RESURGENT

Rotorua Morning Post, Volume 1, Issue 160, 29 February 1932, Page 7

MAN RESURGENT

GOLF OVERCOME POWER OF THOUGHT TRIUMPHS OYER ALL BUNKERS AND STYMJES. THE WAY TO PLAY THE GAME. The business of golf, so the accusation runs, originated in Scotland. And that was a long time ago. At the present day, in Great Britain alone, one only has to think of a number and multiply it by the National Debt, and the total courses where this game is played reveals itself, write B. L. Jacot in the Daily Mail. Considering this, it seems strange to me that the progress of civilisation should have been held up until last week, when, as all the world may now know, the Secret of Golf was vouchsafed to me. No palliative, no halfmeasures such as the amputation of both arms, no side-stepping the issue with tasteless tablets slipped secretly into the patient's early morning tea. Few realise that no one has ma&tered this game and that no one ever will — played as men now play it. The sheer genius of my idea lies in the free and absolute acceptance of this fact. That is the start in theory. In fact, it happened like this. "What you should do," said the professional last 'Wednesday at 9.47 a.m., "is praetise swinging at the ball." "Swinging?" It seemed to me, a normal male adult, that I. had been swinging for some time on that first tee, and "at the ball" summed up the result pretty neatly. "Place an ordinary doormat on the ground anywhere in the open," he explained, "and swing over it." "No ball." He turned back as he walked away, to add: 'You won't miss it." The First Step. "If I hit at a ball and didn't miss it," I told him, piqued, "it wouldn't be me." But I tried the idea. And that was the first step in the epochmaking discovery. After I had improved the beginnings by pegging down the doormat, I found a vast improvement come over my driving. With no ball to worry about I put yards on to my length. And five times out of six I was plumb in the middle of the fairway. "That dog's-leg seventh?" I challenged myself. "Easy." Fixing the mat sternly, I let go. A beautiful drive, all of 280yds, and shutting my eyes proudly I watched it curve magnificently round the copse. Forty yards from the pin, but at that point just off the velvet in the longer grass. Turning the mat over, I took up my mashie-niblick. Screwing the eyes tight, I stood on one leg as that elean, crisp shot ran round the rim of the hole. Bad luck, but I sank the 12in putt with ease. That afternoon I took my mat down beyond the cucumber frames. With rb I eaT-ried my bag of clubs, arid starting from the first tee I advanced the doormat hole by hole round the vegetable garden. The round was encouraging; only three strokes above the record for the course. This gratifying result sown, then, what can be accomplished by merely avoiding the expense of playing with a ball. But more was to come. My old friend the professional poked his head over the fence of the kitchen garden the following morning. That fence lines the third hole, and I suspect that the man had been looking for me on the course. He is fond of a good laugh.

Club-less Swing. "How's it coming along?" he inj quired. j I stabbed the mat with my brassie. I "Fine." And picked up a skimmer | from a not-too-easy lie, placing it neatly on the green. But the professional shook his head. "You would have topped that one," | he recorded. I said nothing, although j I knew it was a lie. "You're wrist- | bound. Not free enough. Try swing- ; ing withoiit the club, sir." "No club?" "No club. However, use an interlocking grip — and praetise getting an easy body-rhythm." When he had gone I laid aside the club. The improvement was startling. My only trouble — that of hitting the mat — disappeared. I played a perfect round, this time OI admit it with all diffidence) equalling the record for the course made by Tilden,'or Tolley, or someone in 1924. ilt occurred to me as I triumphantly began another round that, since I had sof ra conquered golf as to play the game standing still, I no longer required the mat and the bag of clubs. I replaced the mat by the back door and carried the clubs into the study. And now one has to pause to consider the inevitable logic of this Empireshaking discovery. A boy on a motor-cycle had just delivered the morning papers. The Daily Mail lay qh my desk. As I reached for it aiid sank ipto my favourite armchair like a flash the thought came to me that with the astounding improvement in my driving I might be able to carry the bunkers masking the first green at 300yds. Full of confidence — the quick uplift of spirit that comes of smashing through 'obstacles which hitherto -have defeated man — full, then, of beans at scoring over Colonel Bogey at his own game, I addressed the ball on that first tee, Long shall I remember that drive. / Sailing over the bunkers it bound^d on to the green. Twice, in the distance, ' I saw it bounce, then it trickled neatly over the velvet within a push of the pin. With a round so auspiciously begun, there was nothing I could do but continue for the remaining seventeen holes. Putting aside for the moment my morif'ng paper, I lay back in the chair. And the result? Believe it or not, a new record for the course! It se'qmed then that nothing could be added to my invention. 'One had no bal/s, no clubs, no subscriptions, no caddies — in fact, no courses at all. Every|>ne has somewhere to sit quietly anfi think. Could it be simpler than uhis? I pondered. i Complete Triumph." fn Paris three statues of Pasteur stand to\ commemorate man's victory over hyrtVphobia. How many, !T wonder wistfwlly, shall London show to mark man\s victory over the age-old demon of golf ? I dreamt of myself rendered iniScottish granite, address-

not until morning, with the early cup of tea, that my contribution to man's happiness was rounded off into completeness — the fey touch that lingers where Genius has passed. Come the time, as I put aside the empty cup, when a man must think of parting company with his warm bed — the time to dress, breakfast, and face the morning round of golf. ' That loathly moment came — and with it came finality! "You have, for the benefit of posterity, reduced this wearing game of golf," I told myself, "to the ease and comfort of reflection in a fireside armchair. Why an armchair ? " Like all great things, it seemed so simple then. With a grateful yawn I