[Brent Hutto]

For every golfer who appreciates a hole played intellegently and with finesse there are ten golfers who most appreciate seeing the ball go a long way in the air and land on target.

Put another way, which of these things would a typical golfer rather experience?

1) Playing a 370-yard Par 4 (on his 6,500-yard home course) with a Titleist Professional (c. 1995) by hitting driver 225 yards followed by a well-struck 6-iron from 145 yards that ends up fifteen feet from the hole.

2) Playing a 410-yard Par 4 (on his 7,000-yard home course) with a ProV1 (c. 2005) by hitting driver 250 yards followed by a well-struck 6-iron from 160 yards that ends up twenty feet from the hole.

Well, obviously he'd rather have success with the longer shots even though he has a better chance at birdie on the shorter hole. The problem of course is that even if the new ball gives him 25 more yards on the drive and 15 more yards on the approach (which ain't gonna happen) he's going to hit the longer shots farther off line most of the time.

But our typical golfer doesn't realize that. He notices that his best drive of the round goes much farther with the new equipment and that he can occasionally hit a 6-iron 160 yards which he could never do with the old equipment. So he wants the new stuff because he believes it will let him play a 7,000-yard course just as well as he used to play a 6,500-yard one.

It's fine for us architecture snobs to enjoy the strategic merits of a fun and interesting old 6,400-yard course, all the while realizing that it's not a pushover for us no matter how easily Davis Love III or this year's NCAA champion could dismantle it. But we can't lose sight of the fact that for most golfers the elemental joy of the game is hitting a ball a long way in the air and landing it near a well-protected target.

[Rick Shefchik]

Brent -- I know I'm not going to convince anyone else that Davis Love's views of the current golf situation are wrong, but I feel the need to explain my objections to his views one more time, since I might not be making myself clear.

To me, it's not about taking the longball away from the average player. I'm more than happy to let the non-professional (or non-competitive amateur) hit whatever ball he wants with whatever club makes him happy.

But I believe those ProV1s and R7 drivers used by the pros will continue to necessitate more acreage being purchased and more dirt being moved, thus driving up the cost of the game for all of us. At the same time, the pro game becomes less interesting to watch (for me, and others too, I believe), driving down ratings and ticket sales, which ultimately will affect the paychecks of the pros who will follow Love onto the tour.

If that happens, I will miss seeing the game played the way it used to be played, but I'll get over it; Love's successors, on the other hand, may find themselves walking into an NHL-type situation where the increasingly one-dimensional game finally hits a brick wall: The rights fees are too high and the viewership is too low. If that leads to less exposure for golf on TV, I think fewer people will take up the game.

If I thought blasting away with high-tech equipment was the best way to ensure a healthy future for golf, I wouldn't care what Love says. But my gut tells me we're going in the wrong direction, for a multitude of reasons, and that a Competition Ball would be a terrific solution that would hurt almost no one.  

[Gary_Nelson]

A competition ball will hurt golf because it takes away the link between regular golfers and PGA Tour players.

Brent's assumption of a 250 yard drive, conservative as it may sound, is still a dream for most players.

I still think fairway centerlines have spread in recent years which eats up more acreage than an extra 500 yards in length.

[Rick Shefchik]

But anyone who wants to play the equipment the pros play would be perfectly free to play the Competition ball. I know I'd try it. I'm sure many would.

As has been pointed out on this board in this thread and many others, any link between a regular golfer's game and the pro's game is a total delusion in the mind of the amateur, anyway -- but playing the Competition ball would allow regular golfers to sustain the delusion if they wanted to. More power to 'em.

[Alfie]

Brent,

Who is a "typical" golfer ?

A typical scratch to say - 12 handicapper has a realistic goal in achieving your examples.
A typical 13 - 28 hcpr dreams of achieving the same results.

Everybody, including Love etc, assumes that length is the ultimate goal ? Even my wife would disagree with that (I hope ?)
Maybe that's because so much influence is supressed upon typical golfers that length gives the greatest pleasure. I would argue that the typical golfer would give his back teeth to see him / her realise 18 straight pars on any golf course with the only sacrifice being the loss of a few yards on his / her distance averages ?

I would also argue that for every single golfer who takes a keen interest in all the subtleties of playing the game and it's rules and administration - there are 10 who couldn't give a shit what's thrown at them. In other words ; there aint goin to be a revolt by the introduction of rolled back ball which, on the long run, might just make the game more pleasurable and affordable for greater numbers. I've seen, and sympathised, with many hackers on a 600 yard par 5 that gives them no pleasure at all with modern equipment and balls. They know their goals are unachievable with their "hacker" game. But that's the opposite on, say, a 380 yard par 4 ! Then, anything is achievable with one good drive and a holed approach with the driver again ?

The longer courses become in the future (and they'll HAVE to keep up with progression), then I firmly believe you'll see far fewer hackers taking up golf. And the world of golf needs it's 99.9% of hackers !

Just an addition in case anyone thinks I'm against progression and technology. I'm not, when it's beneficial to something or someone.
Look at the fantastic advances in telecommunications / TV / computors etc....... Anyone ever notice how these technologies become much cheaper and affordable to ye masses of the world ? Isn't it somehow strange that golf appears to be in reverse mode from all other technologies ?
Answers on a postcard to the USGA / R&A.

Alfie.

[TEPaul]

"But anyone who wants to play the equipment the pros play would be perfectly free to play the Competition ball. I know I'd try it. I'm sure many would.

As has been pointed out on this board in this thread and many others, any link between a regular golfer's game and the pro's game is a total delusion in the mind of the amateur, anyway -- but playing the Competition ball would allow regular golfers to sustain the delusion if they wanted to."

Rick:

While I certainly am not disagreeing with you on what you said there I feel that one is extremely tricky business. I do not disagree with what Gary Nelson just said either.

All I know is that there has always been one unified set of I&B rules in golf for all players and creating two of them could be extremely tricky business in maintaining that important delusion that the manufacturers have banked on (deceptively I might add) for so long.

It appears even Love in what he said in that article may not totally appreciate what a virtual distance rollback across the board would do.

What happened in the last 15 or so years is manufacturers managed to create technology (perhaps not even exactly realizing what was happening until they were well into it) that only benefited the high MPH players and not others (although they certainly alway claimed it helped everyone ).

If they were asked to rollback distance across the board with the ball they would be removing the recent distance spike from the high MPH players by doing so but they would also really penalize distance-wise all the rest of the golfers who never have benefit from this recent distance spike anyway.

Of course a competition ball would get around that because in essence it should simply remove this technologic spike that only benefited high MPH players which of course all tour players are but it really would create two sets of I&B rules and regs for the first time.

[Brent Hutto]

Alfie,

I guess I was thinking about the typical club golfer I play with every weekend. Handicaps 6-11, drive the ball 220 most times and 250 once a round. Think of their 150-yard club as being an 8-iron when it's really a solid 7-iron at best. Almost to a man they all play ProV1 golf balls and I'd say 8 out of 10 use the ProV1x.

I'm the 13-28 handicapper you're referring to and you're right those distances are a dream for me. Yet when I make the comment (frequently) that the course is more fun for me from the 6,000 yard white tees than the 6,400 yard blacks I always get the same comment "You're not nearly old enough to play from up there". If you're 40 or 50 years old...whether you can reach those 380-yarders in two or not...whether or not you can break 90 from the blacks...you're not really playing golf if the course isn't 6,400 yards and up.

Now is that attitude an artifact of watching golf on TV? Probably. Is it from watching the young college guns tear our course apart from 6,800 yards? In part. But it's now truly engrained in nearly everyone (present company apparently excepted) expectations of what the game is about.

Honestly, I'll be perfectly happy if the USGA can somehow get off their collective butt and make sure Titleist doesn't introduce a new ball and driver next year that Ernie Els can hit 15 yards farther than his current titanium-ProV1x combo. A modest rollback of the ball (3-5%) is probably doable since in reality it won't cost the weekend hacker a perceptible amount of distance and it won't cost him any strokes. But the horse left the barn several years ago when the USGA was still insisting that testing balls with a wooden driver at Corey Pavin clubhead speeds was all that was necessary.

Davis Love III (like our wives) understands that length is not the holy grail (easy to say when you hit it as long as he does). The guys I see every time I play golf might say that but they don't really internalize it. If all they cared about was making 18 pars in a row one day they'd be practicing their four-footers and learning to chip the ball close to the hole from 30 yards. Instead, they're out there taking lessons and buying new drivers and hitting ProV1x balls into the woods because the game is pretty much about distance.

[Rick Shefchik]

Very true, Tom, and I am not discounting that two sets of B&I rules might have a huge effect on a game that has not had that split before.

We seem to be heading swiftly towards a point where we have to choose between the relative damages caused by A) two sets of rules and B) pervasive and game-warping distance gains.

Maybe we've already reached that point. The USGA doesn't seem to think so, and neither does DL III, but if we haven't reached it, we're getting closer every year.

[Alfie]

Rick,

Can't agree more with your comments on this thread !
But the Comp ball "can't" happen, unless the governing bodies do a u-turn on their agreed "Statement of Principles" ? Personally, I think it (comp ball) would prove to the world of golf that a rollback is no bad thing (even if it aint the American way !) and that hackers would immediately do what they always "try" to do - emulate their peers with the "same" equipment / balls. Of course, with the comp ball, every golfer has the "choice" to try out that ball, or just continue hitting their 300 yard bombers - as all golfers do ?

Hootie Johnson has the power to start this ball rolling - does he have the will ?

Alfie

[TEPaul]

RicKS:

I feel you are a very reasonable man in the manner in which you present your opinions on this issue. Taken all in all it is not as easy an issue as some would like to make it and that needs to be taken into consideration as this thing evolves, eventually for the better I hope. The smartest thing, in my opinion, for anyone considering this entire issue who has the power to affect it should simply be to put golf course architecture front and center and make decisions on I&B from there.

[George Pazin]

I don't buy the time and money argument as a limiting factor in golf.  

Time:  There is negligible different when you add another 30 minutes to a 6 hour round.  Those making a time commitment to play golf have already blocked out an entire afternoon.

Money:  Sure you can buy the $500 driver.  But you can also buy last year's model for $199.

I think the barrier to entry is more about desire with respect to leisure time alternatives (ie. Nintendo).

As for land usage, I would suggest that the legal system has increased the required acreage more so than course length.  Wider gaps between fairway centerlines and more buffer to adjacent homes.

Wow, I'm almost not sure where to start here - but I will forge ahead nonetheless.

I often agree with a lot of what you post, Gary, but I think you're way off here.

Time? I rarely have an opportunity to block off an entire afternoon, but if 4 hours were the norm, or even considered slow, as it is overseas, I could definitely find time for more 9s and 18s.

If you wish to argue that technology has a minimal impact on time, that is another thing entirely, but time is certainly issue number 1 for me. I'd be surprised if it weren't #1 for a lot of people.

Money? Since the majority of new courses seem to bill themselves as championsihp courses, they must be by default over 7,000 yards from the tips. Regardless of where the regular men's tees fall, this is going to be a long slow walk. I suppose there are some rare instances with older courses where one might actually have to walk back to a tee, but you have to admit, this is rare.

Cart usage is equally at fault here - there is certainly a better than average chance that a 6,500 yard course would be equally unwalkable with many modern courses, because of the willingness of golfers to accept long green to tee rides. But it is hard to argue that without the obsession with championship layouts that can withstand a bunch of guys hitting 320 yard drives, we'd see more 6300-6500 yard courses built.

The extra yardage doesn't just add to the playing distance. As you noted, playing corridors do indeed have to be wider. Environmental regulations likely add to the problem here as well. But these are things that occur regardless of the technological state, so all these things being equal, a longer course will certainly add to both the time and dollar expense of playing golf.

I haven't purchased a club yet more than $120, yet the cost of playing golf is still quite high to me. My limited experience has been that the inexpensive 6500 yard courses around me are doing better than the brand new 7200 championship layouts, but that's purely an anecdotal observation. If golf were my livelihood, I'd reflect more on this, but it's merely my obsession.

I also don't own a Nintendo, so I'm not sure what that has to do with anything.

As for DLIII, he is kidding himself if he thinks that technology won't affect him or his pocketbook. I don't know many people as obsessed with golf as me, and I have stopped watching the normal weekly events, because there is little entertainment in watching guys hit driver wedge every hole and whoever holes the most putts wins. Outside of the majors, the TPC, Kapalua and Riviera, I have almost stopped watching golf. That should scare the shit out of any PGA/USGA higher ups (I used to tape Sunday action every week to watch later if I was busy), but if they wish to stick their heads in the sand like the honorable ostrich, they should at least recognise the risk in doing so. The higher ups now aren't the ones who will pay the price - it's there successors who will.

I for one won't be too surprised if we start reading articles in a few years wondering who killed the golden goose.

[Gary_Nelson]

George,

I'd really like to believe that golf takes 4 hours.  Public course reality is 5 hours plus travel time plus warm-up time plus apres-golf drinks (sometimes).  I don't think an extra 500 yards of golf cart driving is the biggest issue in the overall experience.

As for golf on TV, I'm only attracted to watching when they play the famous courses.  I don't really care if they are hitting wedges to the greens because the scale is lost to me on TV.  I prefer to see wedges hit on Riveria than Avenel.  The homogenization of venues is a detraction to viewership (IMO).

Personality wise, we all seem to be hankering for the "good old days" with Chi Chi, Lee, Jack, Arnie, etc.  I think the networks have dropped the ball on developing and featuring personalities.  There are a few colorful guys in golf these days (Daly, Parnevik, etc) but there has got to be a bunch more that just don't get the attention from TV.

As for the future of golf, developing young players will be based on many factors and I'm no expert here.  Golf has to compete with soccer or videogames.  I'm doing my best to influence my 2 kids to play the game but there will come a time where they will make their own decision to pursue the sport or not.  

More acreage for new courses is certainly a cost factor.   The business case to build the course will have to reflect the new standards.  This may bring in housing developments to offset these increased land costs.  Not sure where I'm going with this post so I'll end it here.

[Alfie]

Brent,
Excellent response and I hear what you're saying. It's all down to a bit of education and I can hear the masses calling me a pompous b****** (which I'm not) ! Who is educating the 99.9% of golfers ? David Feherty ?
Personally, I'd rather listen to (but not entirely agree with) the likes of ; Nicklaus, Player, Woosnam, Nick Price, Dave Thomas, Cupp, Faldo, Els, Geoff Shackelford, John Huggan, my wife etc........................that golf needs a solution to a definable problem, aka distance !

A guy was nearly hung many years past for making the crazy statement that - "the world was actually round" ! Trying to impress that a rolled back ball might prove saner, is, I feel, much the same in our modern era ? Then again, maybe the world is a square ?

BTW. Horses are usually returned to the barn - and genie's put back in bottles  

I'd go for a game of golf tomorrow. But you know what - I can't afford it !

Always enjoy "YOUR OWN" game, Brent. What others do and think, is up to them.

Alfie

[Alfie]

George,

Ditto, ditto, ditto...................

.....

Tom,

The issue IS simple, it's just people, golfers and the industry who make the issue ultra complicated !
Too many within the world of golf, and especially those with "influence" - speak with forked tongue ! Some open ended honesty would not go amiss if we are to solve an identified problem ?

As I've quoted Peter Dawson (secy R&A) on here before (Jan o4 on Sky TV) ;
-Asked if their was a crisis in golf he replied – “I don’t believe there is any crisis – but we have to ensure that skill is not super-ceded by technology !” “We have to be sure that what we do, is in golf’s best interests.”
On the present level of golf ball technology he said – “the ball is probably right at the limit of it’s parameters ?” and confirmed the fact that – “re-formatting the ball (it’s performance levels) would be a relatively simple process !”
.......

Simple - not complicated when their is the will to do it ?

Alfie

[Mike_Clayton]

Americans probably don't realize but most of the rest-of-the-world had, in effect,a competition ball all through the 70s and early 80s.
Almost all amateurs played the small ball but pros played the big ball - the 1974 British Open was the first big ball Open.
Any amateur who wanted to be a pro played the big ball - which went 25 yards shorter and required more precise hitting


It made no difference to the game and it proved the game could survive with different balls - and two sets of rules.

[TEPaul]

MikeC:

Post #39 is an interesting observation. The small ball/big ball coexistence was an evolutionary thing though from two separate sides and not something the two ruling bodies in the world of I&B actually got together and legislated. Up until that point in the 1970s and 1980s it was really just a matter of two organizations doing things with the golf ball independent of one another.

From the early 1950s through the late 1980s the two ruling bodies in I&B and playing rules did work together to unify both the playing rules of golf and the I&B rules of golf to create an atmosphere of "unification" thoughout the world within the playing rules and the I&B rules. The reasons they did that are obvious and most think were probably for the better.

It would be interesting to know, at this point, if the R&A ever bothered to do the type of scientific distance testing for the old small ball the way the USGA has done in recent years with the unified spec ball. I would serious doubt the R&A ever did that. In other words, what distances would these tour players today be hitting the golf ball if they used the old small ball spec rules and regs, if any even existed for distance limitation?

A competition ball is certainly a way to go. It would reign in the higher mph players today and leave the rest of the world of goflers virtually unaffected distance-wise but it would be a matter of choice (two sets of spec limitations for the first time).

Wouldn't it be a better solution if the ruling bodies of golf just asked the manufacturers to basically reverse the tech advancement they accomplished with the ball in the last 10-15 years which has benefited only high mph players (I think most know and understand what happened!). That would in effect reign back the distance spike of high mph players and leave the rest of golfer in this world unaffected distance-wise and we'd still have one set of I&B rules and regs.

[TEPaul]

MikeC:

The problem here, as I see it, and as perhaps evidenced by some of these statements by Davis Love in that article in this thread is that both ruling bodies in I&B have no real intention of either rolling back distance for any level of golfer and they have no intention of creating a two set of I&B rules and regs on golf balls by the institution of a "competition" ball either.

It seems their only aim for the future is to try to limit distance as best they can at the point it has gotten to now.

However, if one looks carefully at some to the ideas that have been floated recently by the USGA it seems they have begun to talk about the idea of some type of virtual rollback, at least in theory.

But this is probably just the beginning of the merry-go-round of ruling body/manufacturer informal negotiation which may or may not lead to some distance alteration. If the maufacturers actually pick-up and begin to develop what the USGA is virtually asking for we may get a form of distance roll-back but the more likely scenario (and one that happened in the last few years with the USGA's proposal on "Optimization" testing is that the manufacturers will balk and the ruling bodies will simply decide to try to live with the status quo and limit it at that as best they can in the future.

[TEPaul]

The thing that sort of disappoints me about the R&A at this point, though, is they have really said or done nothing it seems to even float an idea of some form of rollback. Any word from the R&A is just some generalization that there may be some concern. The USGA, on the other hand, has actually floated the idea publicly about an actual percentage rollback even if in an informal manner. I believe the "idea request" to the manufacturers in percentage form was something like 10-15%. But I haven't heard a single peep from anyone within the R&A on that. Have you?

[David Sneddon]

MikeC:
It would be interesting to know, at this point, if the R&A ever bothered to do the type of scientific distance testing for the old small ball the way the USGA has done in recent years with the unified spec ball. I would serious doubt the R&A ever did that. In other words, what distances would these tour players today be hitting the golf ball if they used the old small ball spec rules and regs, if any even existed for distance limitation?

I'd seriously doubt the R&A did any scientific testing of the small ball vs the large ball back then.  i don't believe the R&A have facilities to test the current balls, leaving it up to the USGA to come up with the relevant data.

I can only offer anecdotal evidence - the small ball goes further and is less affected by the wind.  The larger ball was, by comparison, easier to control around the green.

There is precedent for two different types of ball.

[TEPaul]

"There is precedent for two different types of ball."

David:

One could say that but is that the type of precedent that would work well today? Having two sets of ball specs between the USGA and R&A was something that just evolved out of the beginning of golf's organizations in the last century. To go back to that would be to claim at this point that unification to a single type ball was not a good idea. Is that what we want to do now? There were some good reasons for going to a unified ball back then---it resolved some problems about what tournament players were using in tournaments. Should we have a "competition" ball now and give tournament players the choice of using it or the ball we have now? That's essentially the way it used to be before the "unification" of the ball, I think. And all of that preceded the local rule used in almost every single tournament today known as the "One Ball Rule".

[Alfie]

Mike,
Absolutely correct ! I remember playing club golf in Scotland where every player had the "option" of using the 1.62 or the 1.68 in a Medal round. The rule, if I remember correctly, was that in no way were you allowed to interchange between the two balls in any given 18 hole round.

This fear of Bifurcation is a fallacy. Does one set of rules cover the entire scope of international golf as we speak ? I don't think so !

But in regard to the workhorses of the R&A - they are actually planning a £1.4million testing centre for 2006. We're on the ball now ?

Alfie

[ForkaB]

"There is precedent for two different types of ball."

David:

One could say that but is that the type of precedent that would work well today? Having two sets of ball specs between the USGA and R&A was something that just evolved out of the beginning of golf's organizations in the last century. To go back to that would be to claim at this point that unification to a single type ball was not a good idea. Is that what we want to do now? There were some good reasons for going to a unified ball back then---it resolved some problems about what tournament players were using in tournaments. Should we have a "competition" ball now and give tournament players the choice of using it or the ball we have now? That's essentially the way it used to be before the "unification" of the ball, I think. And all of that preceded the local rule used in almost every single tournament today known as the "One Ball Rule".

Tom

You did not read Mike Clayton's post closely enough.

During the 70's-80's bifurcation in the world outside the USA and Mexico, the pros had no choice as to what ball to play--they had to play the 1.68 ball (i.e. today's ball).  Amateurs could play the 1.62 ball if they wished, but as Mike rightly said, most of the best amateurs (and a few hackers like me....) played the 1.68 ball by choice (as Alfied says, even though you got less distance, it was much better around the greens).

So, uyoung man......there is a solid precedent for bifurcation, and as I have said many times before, the sky did not fall.  Of course, if you want to continue to run around like a chikcen with your head cut off, even before the chop, it is your right as an American and a citizen of the world.  Just don't expect us to follow you!

Rich

[Mike_Clayton]

TE Paul
I'm no sure about the testing with the small ball but if we were still using it the distances it would go would be frightening.
The problem with switching to the big ball was it was designed largely for American conditions - less wind and more demand from courses to get it in the air - but it was really difficult to play in the high winds of Britain and Australia - especially Australia where we have almost no inland golf.
The current ball is even better in the wind than the old small ball - and long hitters are so much straighter because the ball has let them hit harder.

I was at a dinner  a few years ago where Peter Dawson told the assembly there was no problem with the distance the ball was flying - and he is right if he is talking about 99% of golfers.They should make a ball that goes further for them.
There is however a massive problem for the showcase of the game - and it seems so incredibly obvious we need two balls - unless they can do as you suggest and wind back the technical advancement.
Surely with a single rule we have two games - with two rules we could have a single game again.

David.
The small ball was more difficult around the green - but it was almost impossible to buy a balata ball - certainly in Australia. The balls were rocks which was what made them difficult to chip with. A small ball that behaved like the current ball would have been a lot easier around the green than it was.

Alfie.

We used to be able to change from one to the other - I never did but guys used to play the big ball downwind and the small one into it.It was ridiculous.

[Alfie]

for all ; I've posted the entire article for info. Make what you want of it ? Sat 4th June ex www.scotsman.com

Alfie

R&A eyes £1.25m technology test centre

MIKE AITKEN


THE Royal and Ancient plans to spend £1.25million on building club and ball-testing centres in St Andrews, which will open next year and enable the game's governing body outside America to monitor technological advances more effectively.

The finance for these new testing centres will come from the R&A's operating profits for 2004 of £5.25million, which was revealed in its first financial review. The extracts from the club's accounts, due to be published on Monday, detail the first year of the R&A's activity since the separation of the business from a members' club.

Speaking at Royal Birkdale yesterday, Peter Dawson, the chief executive of the R&A, said: "We're going to invest subject to planning permission in research and test facilities in St Andrews. We're looking to build a two-bay driving facility for the robot [which hits balls] on the range.

"We've already done a lot of work in this area and have written to ball manufacturers asking them to produce shorter balls for testing. Obviously the concern that many people have is that there is an aversion to going backwards. It would be a brave man who would try to take golf technology back the way and attempt to persuade the public to accept it."

Dawson also confirmed the R&A last year gave away £1.97million in grant support for golf development and £1.6million in gift aid to its foundation while £2.51million was spent on governance costs. By 2010, the R&A expects to have donated £50million back into the game from the profits generated by the Open.

Although the chief executive reckons the R&A is in a sound position financially, the club does intend to build up reserves, which are currently £20million, to around £70million so that championships can be run if fashions change and the Open no longer generates big profits.

"Our financial side is healthy and we're building up reserves for a couple of years to be completely secure," said Dawson. "To run our amateur events and the governance of the game costs about £4million. And to be able to finance £4million on today's returns, you need around £70million of reserves. This is just prudence, prudence, prudence. We know that all rights for sport on TV can fluctuate."

Dawson explained that TV rights for all sports were "not as rosy as they were a few years ago". The R&A has also been adversely affected in some international TV deals by the fall in the value of the dollar. Meantime, the current British TV deal with the BBC has this year and next to run before renewal. "But we're talking already," he added.

[Alfie]

Mike,
I've argued here, and elsewhere, for a voice of reason in this whole debate. But not the DLove kind !

If there is a problem - find a solution. Otherwise - if it aint broke, then leave it alone ?

Most adhere to the FACT that there is a problem within golf. The question must surely be why nothing constructive has (really) been done to solve the problem !
Give me £10K and a month max and I'll bring golf back all the answers to the hypatheticals being thrown about surrounding this whole issue. We're talking about examining OLD and known technologies to clear the field a little. We have living professionals and even robots to test the old balls. If the gov bodies need some old Dunlop 65's (aye, those were the days) then they'll find thousands of them on EBay. Still in their wrappers !

Believe it not, I recently salvaged a dozen old (and used) balata's from a friend with the intention of going out and testing them for myself using my modern Big Bertha and Wilson irons. Sorry, no results because I've never got round to it. The point is - why the hell are the gov bodies failing to at least TRY a similar excercise ? Simple - but highly complicated thanks to golfing politics.

But I still think we're making ground with the issue - so long as the minority keep chipping away at the 99.9% !

Alfie

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