GOLF.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 77, 9 July 1910, Page 7

GOLF.

A large entry has been secured for the mixed foursomes to be played at Ngamotu this afternoon. It will be a medal round of 16 holes, No. 2, "The Swamp," being left out in each round. Players may choose whether the man or the lady drives off first. The play-off between Mrs. Johns and Weston and Miss Fitzherbert and Armitage resulted in a win for the former. The club handicaps have been revised and a fresh list posted in the golf-house. The limit has been reduced. Competitors are reminded that the handicaps in force on the 2nd inst. will be allowed for the second round for Hood's prize on the 16th inst., but the new handicaps must be used for the St. Andrew's Cross, to be played on the same date. The club championship and junior scratch competition commence on Saturday, 23rd inst. Particulars are 'posted in the golf-house. Entries close on the 16th inst.

Looking through the London Daily News the other day [ alighted on an article headed, "Mallet-headed Putters," in which, strangely enough, reference is made to the local Ngamotu Club. The article is written by .Anthony Spalding, and is full of interest to golfers. The writer says: "As the game of golf is played throughout the world under the rules issued by the Royal and Ancient Club of St. Andrews, its decision to prohibit the use of what are commonly known as "freak clubs'' is of enormous interest. It was not unexpected. There was embodied in the revised rules r„n intimation that it would not "sanction any substantial departure from the traditional and accepted form and make of golf club." It is, in fact, the logical sequence to the reply sent last summer by the Rules Committee to the N.G.A. (sic) Motu Club, New Zealand, in answer to the question, "Is it permissible to use a croquet mallet to put with?" The Rules Committee explicitly stated that a croquet mallet was not a' golf club, and is inadmissible. The ruling created at the time a keen controversy, in which the leading professionals and many of the best amateur players expressed opinions. A curious feature of the discussion was that a strong difference of opinion I existed between them. While the amai teurs. with few exceptions, advocated a 'policy of standardisation of the clubs, most of the prcvssionals were against it. The open champion, J. H. Tayloi;, is, I however, an ardent supporter of a standard club. It should be understood that the interdiction does not apply to the ordinary iron putter with a slight bend at the end of the socket, but ail v iron club in which the socket is so bent or twisted that the club is virtually, if not actually, a mallet-headed one comes milder the ban. It means the committee I do not admit that the vertical croquet stroke is a golfing stroke. Until recently freak clubs have been confined more' or less to the putting class, but since the centre shaft principle (that of freak clubs, to 'bring the point of impact into line with the shaft) has I been advanced other weird-looking clubs /have been put on the market, and Mr. 'P. A. Vaile is said to be about in the I freshness of his enthusiasm to perfect a wooden club shaped exactly like the slice of a cake, with the shaft fixed in the .centre. TJie reason for this is the most part of the game. The many | theories for successful putting extant [' among players all over the world are as wide in their diversity as the systems of I I moral and spiritual ethics which are or'dained for the government of mankind. I All kinds of curious clubs have been invented wherewith the ball may be more 1 readily holed out with unfailing a'ceu- : racy. * Within the past twenty years or l . so probably a hundred devices in the I way of putters, have been put on the market, each of them being recommended ' as possessing the invaluable quality of [ allowing the player to hole out both long ! ,and short puts without failure and withany trembling sensation of hesita- ' tion. Mr. A. C. Croome, as a matter i of curiosity, once kept count of their i different putters used by his partners i and opopnents in the course of a fort- ' night's golfing holiday. He said the total I number of species observed was over : 20. y There is always a market for freak .'clubs, because men are anxious to overcome the difficulties of the game by adl ventitious aids, and so cover up their p deficiency in skill. The unskilful player ( is like the improvident, who are usually j trying to .find some possible means of j : evading the consequences of their improvidence. Everybody who plays golf f -veil recall the race for the Schenectady } putter after the almost supernatural performances with it by Mr. W. <J. ' Travis at Sandwich. T" efe are few golf--3 ers strong enough to remain unaffected 5 by the momentum of pen.lulous opinion, j Many of those who bought them found | " for a brief hour the putter imparted a : surprising ability, and went home with j 5 the sweet asurance that they had at ■ last conquered the heart-breaking diffi- ■ culties of the game, and feeling much ■more like Braids, richly freighted with h fancy, than Joneses with nebulous golfing But the perfection of implements is no guarantee that mind will i triumph over matter. It was proved ) that success in putting does not he in l I the form of club used, at any rate, in i s the Schenectady. After the American i had won the championship with > his American putter, everv player who . I aspired to greatness carried a Schnecl tadv in his bag. Mr. Harold Skimpole, .it will be remembered, took a peach, a i.cup of coffee and claret for breakfast, 'because, he said, they reminded him of, ' the sun. But while the Schnectadv re'l minds us of the sun, general experience -'proves that it, and putters of the mallet '. order, do not help us to solve the prob- / lenis of the game.