Sir Bobbelieves technology is ruining golf
You’d be wrong if you thought everybody got a thrill from seeing Dustin Johnson or Jason Day monster 300-plus yard drives.
Kiwi golfing great Sir Bob Charles believes it’s ruining golf and has called for R&A and US Golf Association bosses to put their heads together and put a stop to the ‘‘ridiculous’’ ball and club technology he believes is tarnishing the sport.
‘‘I’m aghast that they’re allowing it to happen,’’ the 81-yearold former British Open championship winner said.
‘‘You see a 200 yard shot into the green, that used to be a twoiron or a four-wood, nowadays they’re hitting eight-irons in excess of 200 yards.
‘‘It’s ridiculous happening in the game.’’
Charles, who played in the what’s Russley Garden City Legends tournament in Christchurch yesterday, believes players consistently smoking 300-350 yard drives is stretching traditional courses and there isn’t enough space to simply push the tees back to make it a contest.
He has what he thinks is a simple solution, and likened it to the Marylebone Cricket Club last year changing the Code of Laws by restricting the thickness of cricket bats to even up the contest between bat and ball.
‘‘I’m a great believer in reducing the performance of the ball,’’ Charles said. ‘‘In my day, Jack Nicklaus was No 1 in distance off the tee and his average tee shot was 275 yards. I think that they have the technology to put out a ball which does not go further than 275 yards.
‘‘What people don’t realise, it’s only going to affect the Jason Days of this world ... I hit the ball 220-230 yards and it probably would only affect me by six or eight yards, maybe 10 yards, but it would really rein in the longer hitters by a good 40 or 50 yards.’’
As recently as last August, American Dustin Johnson uncorked a massive 439-yard drive on the par-five 16th at the WGCBridgestone Invitational, the longest drive on the PGA Tour since fellow American Phil Mickelson hit a 450-yard behemoth at the Trump National Doral in 2013.
Charles can only shudder at those numbers, but it’s not the only thing he believes is crippling the sport he believes is too expensive, takes too long and is too hard.
He doesn’t have an answer to tackling the cost of the game, but said golf courses were being made too long, and too many players were using tees ill-fitted to their game.
‘‘As a result, they’re taking more strokes, longer to play and taking a lot of fun out of the game,’’ Charles said.
In addition to Charles, 53 pros, including Australian Tomas Mezera, a former Bathurst winner and Holden Racing Team manager, were in the pro-am field of the Russley Garden City Legends tournament.
Three top Russley juniors planning to head to the United States on scholarships – Hiroki Miya, brother Hayato Miya and Dominic Brettkelly – played alongside professionals.
Charles, who has 76 professional wins to his name and still tries to squeeze at least one round in every week or two, will be content as long as he doesn’t shoot beyond his age.
‘‘My long game is quite reasonable,’’ he said. ‘‘My short game, it’s not too bad. My putting is not as good as I’d like it to be. I miss too many short putts.’’