[JESII]

No...but if you can hit it 380 and nobody's ever heard of you I'm not redesigning my course for you...

[Melvyn Morrow]

If you can hit 380 yards why are you playing golf? where is the fun in that, wow the course designer seemed to have screwed up his design - the point is to challenge the golfer not let him seek a Hole in One on a Par 4 or is this what you guys want from your game and courses.

Where is the professional pride or on this case the bloody professional embarrassment - come on designers this is a site to talk about GCA please have the balls or grow some so that you can make a serious comment and explain to us golfers WHY?

This guy destroyed this Hole – WHY -  It certainly is all about BALLS, perhaps also the lack of them.

Melvyn

[JESII]

and brains...and the lack of them too!!!

[Jud_T]

Jim,

How many guys played your course this year that can consistently hit it 275?  How many were there 20 years ago? Do you think it matters?

[JESII]

I'm sure it's much higher...but no, I don't think it matters enough to scream about the USGA/R&A being incompetent.

I think each individual course is the best place to make the decisions.

[Garland Bayley]

No...but if you can hit it 380 and nobody's ever heard of you I'm not redesigning my course for you...

We've probably been through this before. The members kids grow up on the course, play it through college on dad's dime, and then look elsewhere to find a golf home. It would be nice to keep some of these kids home.

Slow down the ball, and these kids can stay home and enhance the definition of family oriented club.

[Melvyn Morrow]

Jim

All that show is that you do not care as much about Golf as I do, of course it fu*#ing matters, these guys are destroying the Holes and Courses, some great Holes and Courses, showing up the quality of our designers because the people in charge can’t or will not be bothered.

It does not matter, well my friend it certainly does matter to this guy, its turning golf in to a fair ground amusement stall.

Apathy is great if you can afford that state of mind but I can’t, the game is in my bloodline and I will fight alone if I have too

As I said above its making pricks out of clubs, owners and designers, but as yet you guys do not see it, you will in time but will it be too late for your game

It matters a great deal.

Melvyn

[JESII]

Melvyn,

Please try to explain the real material issue here.

Is it the maintenance expense of expanded golf courses?

Is it a comprimise in shotmaking requirements across the board?

Is it that the top players have benefited more from modern (last 10-15 years) equipment than lesser players?

Please don't rail against carts or lasers, I know and understand your point. this thread is about driving distance.

Thanks.

[Melvyn Morrow]

Jim

This I agree has nothing to do with carts or electronic devices, it’s all to do with GCA or should we say the total lack of it if a guy can hit 380 yards. It’s to do with lack of responsibility by the Governing Bodies; it’s to do with the destruction of our great Holes and Courses.

It's to do with even a small increase say by 3 yards or 5 to 7 yards a year, it’s all destructive and yes the final point perhaps is the cost for all this noting that some older courses cannot expand much further.

It’s about design, it’s about what golf, the skills and the challenge of man against man and Nature, but it is becoming far less a challenge by allowing technology to improve one’s score, it’s about flying over a course instead of facing and navigating the course and its hazards.

It’s about making a mockery of design and it’s about playing golf honouring the game and keeping to the Spirit of the game, of honouring all past players and golfers, designers and Green Keepers who have worked so hard for our enjoyment, yet due to weakness on behalf of our Governing Bodies all this can and will be destroyed because they no longer look at golf the game but golf that pot of Gold at the end of the rainbow.

It’s about not giving a sh#t apart for the money and it’s about keeping the game open and honest, it’s about us being sportsmen and women in other words it’s about GOLF

Melvyn

[JESII]

Who cares about the guy Garland spoke of that hits it 380...he's sitting next to Garland in the 19th hole.

[DMoriarty]

I'm sure it's much higher...but no, I don't think it matters enough to scream about the USGA/R&A being incompetent.

I think each individual course is the best place to make the decisions.

Jim,

Perhaps you could explain why you are absolving the USGA/R&A of all responsibility in this matter?  Last I checked, golf was a game, and like any other game it is largely defined by its rules. And there is substantial evidence that the game is out of whack, out of balance.   What better way to address this than by tweaking the rules?

Why shouldn't the USGA/R&A he responsible for fixing the problem?   Or is your real argument that there is no such problem?

[JESII]

I don't see a real problem that can be addressed and impacted by the USGA/R&A.

I think the economic environment has been a negative drag but I think that's cyclical...I think it'll bounce back to a healthier state regardless of what we say or do on here.

I think maintenance standards can, should and will be reconsidered with the goal being sustainability and playability...but will readily admit that when the economic cycle rebounds the maintenance standards will creep back up.

I think overall pace of play should be improved but cannot imagine how or why the governing bodies should get into that one...


Let me ask you this, David. What will be the result of an equipment rollback? The practical result for you and I?

[DMoriarty]

I don't see a real problem that can be addressed and impacted by the USGA/R&A.

I think the economic environment has been a negative drag but I think that's cyclical...I think it'll bounce back to a healthier state regardless of what we say or do on here.

I think maintenance standards can, should and will be reconsidered with the goal being sustainability and playability...but will readily admit that when the economic cycle rebounds the maintenance standards will creep back up.

I think overall pace of play should be improved but cannot imagine how or why the governing bodies should get into that one...

I don't understand any of this.  I thought we were talking about the technologically driven jump in driving distance over the past dozen or so years for golfers with high swing speeds.  It looks to me like this jump dwarfs any other technological driven jump in the history of the game.  That is the problem to which I refer.

Given that the equipment is ultimately a RULES question, why shouldn't the USGA/R&A address the problem?  Or do you not see this as a problem?   Above you said you don't see this as a problem the ruling bodies could impact or address.  I don't get this.  Why couldn't they change the rules governing the equipment?  

Let me ask you this, David. What will be the result of an equipment rollback? The practical result for you and I?

That depends upon the nature of the rollback.  But it were done intelligently (seems a big "if" at this point) a rollback of the ball shouldn't impact me much at all.  I don't have a high swing speed, so I have benefited very little if at all from the new balls relative to the old balls.   For example, if you gave me balatas vs. any of the balls going,  I don't think I would be noticeably worse off, except perhaps I would have to buy balls more often.  

As for you, well you wouldn't be able to hit the ball nearly as far.  Too bad for you.   But I don't feel that sorry for you, because you'd still be able to hit it well by me, just as better players could hit it well by the likes of me before this absurd explosion at the top end.  You'd' still wax me, but it might be a more pleasant match for both of us because we might both fit on the same course.

In other words, the gap between long and short could be reigned in by pushing back on the top end while leaving the short end where it always has been.   The short end hasn't benefited much, so there is no reason the short end would have to suffer.  As things are now the relative advantage of long over short is way out of whack.  

Now all that is about the ball.   I'd welcome pushing back the other equipment as well, whether or not it benefited me.

[Sean_A]

David

What is in whack between a long and short driver?  What has historically been in whack between a long and short driver?

Ciao

[Jud_T]

Sean,

One of the great things about golf is that people of differing abilities can play together and have a match and a fun time on the same playing field as opposed to tennis or skiing where one must play with someone of similar ability to enjoy oneself fully.  If we are coming to the point where you and I are playing 6000 yard classic gems and the sticks (or my son in the above example) are playing 8000 yard tournament tracks almost exclusively a key element of the attraction of the sport has been lost in my estimation. 

[Sean_A]

Jud

So what is an acceptable difference of yardage between players in a match?  It is my understanding this difference has grown steadily (or not) since there were good players and bad players - so since the game was invented.  It seems like folks may be saying thaey lament the difference between good players in a match and generally between good and great players.  Perhaps as well that too many people can now hit the ball further than great players.  Is this the case?  If so, I would argue the same thing is said by every generation.  Usually, guys who are past it start to complain about distance, then the case is built up over generations to compare Hogan in his prime to Jack to Tiger.  So how far is too far for the long ball?  When is a distance differential in a match too much?  Would rolling the back 5, 10 or 20 percent make a difference?  Sure, I ask these questions a bit rhetorically, but only to highlight the individual nature of the responses.  There is no set answer, but I guarantee you that if folks want to control distance to have a fun in a match, they don't need a USGA command to do so.  You really can't figure out a way to have a fun match with your son?  If this is the crux of the argument I have somehow missed the importance of it. 

I am not trying to be snarky, only straight forward.  Last Saturday I hit a monstrous drive at Burnham's 2nd hole.  I went past all the fairway bunkers and was nearly level with the left greenside bunkers on a 380 yard hole - I guess it was a 325 yard drive - 50 yards past the furthest I have ever been on that hole - once or twice.  The result was a bogey.  I tell you this for two reasons.  First, golf is about getting the ball in the hole.  Second, I figure I hit it 325 yards which is an immense distance.  Most golfers way over-estimate how far they hit it (just as they way over-estimate wind strength).  This has always been the case and will continue to be so in the future.   

Ciao

[Kalen Braley]

Once again, the apocolypse must be near because I find myself totally agreeing with David M. on this one.   

Other sports in America use "special balls" for competitive play.  The NBA and the NFL for one.  But the analogy I'd like to use is Softball, which is a very big recreational sport.  Back in the 80s, bat manufacturers were getting good at thier craft and the balls were flying out of parks in the top level leagues.  Games would take forever and final scores looked like college football results, 21-14.  It totally threatened all of these fields with outfield fences of 280-300 feet.

So instead of going to great expense and re-configuring all the fields with longer fences, they did the smart thing.  They introduced flight-limited softballs for the top levels of these recreation leagues.  Most levels still used the same ball because they were full of less gifted players who could rarely hit homeruns, even with all the best equipment.  Sure homeruns still were hit every now and then, but man you really had to crank on one to hit it out.

A clear example of a specific problem that only affected a small % of softball games and a elegant solution that still allowed everyone to play on the same field and no new physical changes to the parks were needed.

I see the same thing going on in golf.  The top levels, whether it be Pros of top amateurs could use a limited flight ball for their competitions. No new tees, no added length, no "we can't use that course cause its too short". Meanwhile, all the rest of us can continue to use the same equipment that we have...no changes needed.

Seems like such a simple solution and I don't know why the powers that be aren't doing it.

[Jud_T]

Sean,

Of course there's a way to have a match.  He marches back to the 7500 yard tees while my wife plays off 5200 and I'm somewhere in between and we only see each other on the green.  

[Jerry Kluger]

Just thought I would throw this in:  It has been reported that Lucas Glover has decided to play Nike's old ball because he was hitting the new one too far.  This is a guy who also uses Nike's old square head driver.  The courses just cannot keep up with the distances that the best players hit the golf ball.

[Melvyn Morrow]

Jerry

That means that there is still many things to resolve in golf, we just can’t keep getting longer and longer without some sort of intervention by the ruling bodies, it’s just bloody madness.

We need to step back and look at the problem in depth. My feeling drive me to looking way past a 10-20% roll back but right back to the time of the introduction of the Haskell. It need IMHO to be a real step back or we are going to lose even more great Holes and minimise a designers input leaving only designers of Driving/Target Ranges to apply for new designs. Its utter madness

The real core problem once you take out the R&A is the player themselves with this fixation on their scores, no matter if it’s aided by equipment or poor design they claim it all for the glory of a lower score. We know there is a real question mark about many scores, yet the majority of guy on here and in the game worldwide turn a blind eye. They care not for the damage it’s going to the game, can’t they see these score are in truth meaningless as assisted by technology.

We have the ability to reinvent the game based upon the turn of the 20th Century, we have the technology to rate the equipment utilising the latest methods using science to play the great courses as they were once originally designed to play.  Sorry but it’s all balls simply through the need of proving ones manhood we are destroying the game.

Mad blindness on behalf of the Governing Bodies and basic self-interest of millions of players putting their testosterone levels before the game, yet in old age they may see the errors of their way but will it be too late as yet another younger generation trying to flex their dicks to prove it is the longest. Madness and not worthy to be called golfers IMHO

Melvyn 

[Sean_A]

Sean,

Of course there's a way to have a match.  He marches back to the 7500 yard tees while my wife plays off 5200 and I'm somewhere in between and we only see each other on the green.  

Jud

So the family match was better 10 years ago when your wife played the 5200 yards tees, your son played the 7000 yards tees and you were somewhere in between?  I spose I am not really understanding what it is you want.  If its to play the same tees as your son and wife, then do it.  If its to somehow wish your son didn't hit the ball so far and your wife so short, well, I don't think there ever was a clear answer to that. 

Ciao

Ciao 

[JESII]

David,

I said it quite clearly...

"I don't see a real problem that can be addressed and impacted by the USGA/R&A."

I then listed three 'problems' with golf today and stated that I don't see how the governing bodies can become involved in them. That's it from my end.

If you're truly experiencing difficulty enjoying a game of golf with a guy who is longer than you and want him 10 or 20 yards closer to you after the drives...well, I'd say your priorities out "out of wack"!

[Jud_T]

Sean,

If he played off 6500 and she played off 4800 from not letting distance get out of control not only would it be a more social game but we wouldn't have to decide between A) paying 15% more for my wife and I to play golf or B) playing different courses entirely...

[Sean_A]

Sean,

If he played off 6500 and she played off 4800 from not letting distance get out of control not only would it be a more social game but we wouldn't have to decide between A) paying 15% more for my wife and I to play golf or B) playing different courses entirely...

Jud

Okay, so you are saying you prefer a 1700 yard gap in tees compared to 2300 yards (personally, I still think this is massive for a well designed course).  Is this not possible achieve today simply by choosing the right course to play?  Does there really need to be a rule change by the USGA to achieve this? 

Ciao

[Jud_T]

Of course not.  And he can make his bag really light.  Driver, hybrid, wedge and putter...

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