The ArT of Golf - Society of Hickory Golfers

photo/jan tellstrom
victory smiles. Breck Speed, owner of Mountain
Valley Spring Water, and sponsor of the SoHG”s
Championship Series, congratulates an exuberant
Alan Grieve who holds the USHO trophy.
Alan Grieve on:
AUSSIE
continued from page 21
Practicing:
I don’t practice, just spend about 15-20 minutes on the putting
green pre-match and about 15 minutes stretching. I don’t
want to suffer an injury when I am fortunate enough I can play
year round. When I play in club competitions, I play matchplay
against each of my playing partners in my head, their net score
vs. my gross score. This really keeps you switched on for the
entire round. I see so many players give up on their round after
about 12 or 13 holes and just waste the chance to imagine they
need to shoot a certain number over the closing holes, so when
they do get in that position, they haven’t practised that in a
competition scenario.
Grieve says he’ll be working on
chipping, which he considers the weakest
part of his game.
“I know Rick (Woeckener) won’t
believe this, but my chipping is my
weakest point, I hit so many scummy
bump and runs in the last round that
Rick and Roger (Andrews) both commented,
in their own ways, on the
shots. Those were all tongue-in-cheek
though, hopefully. It’s all right Rick, I
think I have perfected that shot now.”
Last year provided an additional
challenge
with regard
to the record
heat (an
index of 114
on the first
day). But
Grieve grew
up playing
hickory golf:
Enjoy it. In my opinion, hickory golf is not target golf. You
have to allow for some bump and run shots. Positional play. I
now picture shots that are not really the conventional shot, using
the undulations as necessary. This is much more fun.
Clubs in his bag:
I have a mixture of Mike Just and Tad Moore’s clubs and have
recently acquired another set that are Stewart irons with a variety
of woods. I have yet to use them due to the wet weather we
are having here currently.
The future of hickory golf in Australia:
Hopefully good. I will keep playing hickories wherever I go and
this will hopefully interest and encourage others to at least give
them a go. If they do, then they are in for a treat, but you already
know that.
junior golf in such heat, so that wasn’t
his main worry.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he says, “it
was bloody hot on that first round. You
have to keep hydrated. I drank about 6
liters of water on the course and about
6 liters of beer off the course. But, I
played a lot of my junior golf in those
conditions so it didn’t really worry
me too much. But, just like here in
Queensland, the late afternoon/early
evening thunderstorm cooled everything
down for the next day.”
All in all, Grieve says he enjoyed the
USHO and had a great time meeting
new friends and enjoying the Donald
Ross Course. What’s he look forward
to in defense of his title?
“Actually, my goal is to thoroughly
enjoy my four-week golfing holiday
just like last year and meet up with
all the people I met last July and have
another refreshing frosty beverage or
two with them.
“See you in July, mates.”
on home turf. Alan Grieve shared this photo of himself in formal
hickory attire at his home club of Wynnum in Brisbane.
society of hickory golfers 20
spring 2012
spring 2012
letters
from
abroad…
Hickory golf on seaside links
The British Golf Collectors’ Society
has just published its fixture list
for 2012. The programme looks wellbalanced,
with meetings and matches at
many of the usual venues – and just a few
specials to mark their Silver Jubilee. There
are new visits to Borth, one of the earliest
courses in Wales; Fleetwood, believed
to be the site of the oldest links course
in England; and Wallasey, in conjunction
with the annual visit to the Hoylake
links of Royal Liverpool. Other fixtures
catching the eye are Royal Aberdeen and
Ganton, venues of recent Walker Cup
matches, and a heritage fest in St Andrews,
where The Society will play over
the New Course, and socialise in Forgan
House, overlooking the eighteenth green
of the Old Course.
Significantly, 17 of the 29 fixtures are
over seaside links – reflecting BGCS’s
preference for the traditions of golf. But
there are other features of linksland golf
that are important for hickory play. Natural
turf must be one of the most important.
The sand-based soils of linksland drain
well, but are relatively infertile, supporting
the fine, long-rooted fescues and
bents that give smooth putting surfaces
and brassie lies on the fairways. Temptations
to water and fertilise, to which many
clubs succumbed in the mid-years of the
last century, are now being resisted, in a
movement to naturalism that has been led
by R&A agronomists.
There have been some damaging concessions
to the water and fertiliser school,
even on championship courses. Donald
Ford’s 2006 book on the history of the
Carnoustie Links tells how local government
reorganisation in the 1970s brought
course maintenance under the responsibility
of a municipal authority that was more
used to parks and flowerbeds than championship
links. The greensward suffered, and
had to be rescued by a linksland specialist
from St Andrews, before a return to the
Championship rota in 1999.
David Dobby’s recent history tells how
the Royal Cinque Ports Golf Club at Deal
found an effective
way to protect the
course against storm
surges from the
English Channel that
had caused historic
cancellations of Open
Championships and
other tournaments.
But it had unwelcome
side effects; gradual
invasion by meadowland
grass and loss of
links character. Again,
a links specialist from
Scotland applied the
necessary discipline
of spared watering
and chemicals, and
regular aeration. The
photo (top)/courtesy
natural greensward
john fischer iii
has been restored;
carnoustie, above, suf-
the Amateur Chamfered from overwatering
until it was rescued and
pionship returns next restored to the Open
year.
rota in 1999.
There is another
At right, the 8th hole at
attraction of links
Hoylake.
golf that is not
always recognised:
the wind that is often so much stronger
than on sheltered inland courses. Some say
the supreme challenge of golf is the shot
into the teeth of the prevailing wind, to a
high, well-protected green. This requires
imagination and nerve, as well as perfect
execution; a visualisation of how the ball
with move with the wind, as well as the
skill to keep it on the proper flight path.
This is the challenge facing BGCS
members as they contemplate their pitch
up to the eighth green at Hoylake; their
21
mashie into the hogsback tenth at Aberdovey;
the full cleek into the Seventh at Rye.
They know disaster awaits them front,
back and to either side. But the fine detail
of the crisp shot holding its line and the
makeable putt will remain with them long
after they have forgotten their failures.
These are the challenges and exhilarations
of linksland golf.
Jigger
photo/copyright crown (2007) visit wales
aberdovy in Wales will see BGCS play in 2012.
www.hickorygolfers.com