I have fond memories of Formby! Would love to go back someday. I tried (unsuccessfully) to qualify for the 1976 Open Championship there but was 'done-in' and terrorized by the lightening speed of greens that I had never encountered before. I scored 78 twice but in each round took more putts on the greens than shots played to reach the greens. I believe (but I can't be sure) the great, future GURU, Pete Cowan tried to help by giving me a FOC putting lesson in between rounds. What I did not appreciate at the time was that that particular event would create world headlines because of the antics of a certain Maurice Flitcroft (R.I.P) who was also a competitor. I did outscore him! WHen I heard of Flitcroft's passing I was moved to pen the following.
Last May, when I read the headline, “Open Hacker Flitcroft Dies,” it was enough to send me hurtling down a tunnel of nostalgia. How could I forget the former crane driver from Frilford Heath who conned his way into the qualifying rounds of the 106th Open Championship at Formby in 1976?
As an amateur competitor I had to go through the most stringent of qualification criteria but the scrutiny of professional entries was so lax that anybody could have entered as a pro, as Flitcroft had done. The result was a lot of red faced, red rossetted, R&A Officials scrambling around the dunes of Formby in a heatwave with steam rising from their binoculars.
I was quietly practicing my putting, trying to keep my frayed nerves at bay when a Marty Feldman lookalike from the movie, The Last Remake of Beau Geste suddenly appeared. Professional golfers don’t like to be disturbed while at their ‘work.’ Though a lowly amateur, I’m no different. With the help of an impromptu lesson from Pete Cowan, later to become one of Britain’s top golf coaches, I was attempting to come to grips with the quickest putting surfaces I had ever encountered when Flitcroft began scuttling balls in all directions, causing widespead mayhem and much disgruntlement. Before a major row erupted, he was called to the 1st tee where he produced a rickety pull cart and a set of weapons that had clearly seen better days from behind a privat hedge. The perplexed R&A Starter knew instantly that something was badly awry. He made a half-hearted effort to prevent Flitcroft from teeing off but the die was cast. 46-years old Maurice Flitcroft was about to enter the annals of Open Championship history. 121 strokes and five and a half hours later, as he left Formby’s 18th green, Flitcroft was besieged by a bevy of eager golf reporters and was being treated like a celebrity.
“I wasn’t really ready for this championship. I felt under the pressure of the big event. To be quite frank, I was a bit erratic but I did manage to pull it together towards the end of the round.” He told the gob-smacked press corps. Pulling it together must have been a reference to the only par on his card at the 14th. After a wild hook, he had hacked back onto the fairway before skulling a mid-iron that clattered into the flagstick and stopped dead in its scorching tracks within three feet of the hole.
“I’ve always been inspired by watching golf on the telly. I bought some secondhand clubs and started to practice in the field behind my Mum’s house. I am completely self-taught, you know, I’ve always been a bit of an athlete. I thought it would be nice to play in The Open with Jack Nicklaus and all that lot; it would give me some encouragement. After all, I haven’t reached my peak yet. Some of those top stars have been at it for years. I’m going to improve and be back next year, watch out! And if I manage to win, I’ll retire and take up painting. I’m quite an artist as well!” Flitcroft told the agape members of the media.
Nor was that the end of Mr. Flitcroft, he tried to tee it up again the following day but he was hastily escorted off the premises by several R&A officials. Believe it or not seven years later, when he said: ‘His golf had improved immeasurably and he was quite confident of breaking 100.’ Flincroft had his entry under the assumed name of Gerald Hoppy from Switzerland accepted again. He successfully teed off at Pleasington, making it as far as the ninth hole in 63 strokes, before a posse of R&A officials caught up with him. His final, parting shot to the press was: “Everything was going well and according to plan until I five-putted the 2nd.”
Back at Formby, after one of the most excruitiatingly slow rounds I have ever played, in which I managed to 3-putt an unprecendented seven times for an otherwise ‘unFlitcroft-like” 78, I arrived at the Recorder’s Tent half-an-hour after Flitcroft had departed, suffering from shock. I have to admit that golfers are a self-centered bunch. The cause of my discomfort was more due to my horror putting and being terror-stricken to see my Australian playing companion, Ron Wood, smash both his putter and driver into smithereens in quick succession before hurling them deep into the forest than the slowness of play.