COMPETITION PLAY

It is the same game whether it is match or medal play, and the same whether you are merely engaged in friendly rivalry with an old friend, with half a crown or nothing at all but the good game itself at stake, or testing your skill and giving rein to your ambition in a club or open tournament with gold medals and much distinction for the final victors. But, same game as it is, how convinced have we all been at times that it is a very hard thing to play it always in the same way. How regularly does an evil fate seem to pursue us on those days when we are most desirous of doing ourselves full justice. Five times in a week will a golfer go round the course and beat bogey, reckoning after each performance that he has only to repeat it on Saturday to win the prize which he covets, with several strokes to spare. Then Saturday comes, and a sad falling off is there. By the time the sixth or seventh hole is reached, the all-important card has perhaps been torn up into little pieces and flung contemptuously into a convenient ditch.

Of course much of this sort of thing is due to nervousness, and there is no game in which full control of the nerves and extreme coolness are more necessary than in golf. Let the player be as keen as he likes the keener the better but if he is apt to become too anxious at the critical stage of a round or match, he is not the man who will ever win prizes in great competitions. He who is the most composed when in difficulties and when the game is going against him, and who treats each fresh trouble as it comes along as a part of the ordinary day’s work to be surmounted in the best manner possible, is the player who will most frequently come out the conqueror. In many cases the tendency to fall into a highly nervous state at the smallest provocation will disappear with time and lengthening experience. Each year of golf should bring increasing steadiness, and the steadier a golfer becomes the more frequently will he do his best scores when they are most wanted. And so I must leave it to time and practice and the proper cultivation of the best methods to bring the ambitious beginner along into the front rank of his contemporaries. But still there are some useful hints which I may offer him and which may facilitate his progress towards the acquisition of medals and cups.

To begin with, there is a little sermon to be preached on that torn card. “Nil desperandum” should always be the motto of the competition player, and it is a motto that will probably pay better in golf than in any other game. I think it is very likely that some scores of monthly medals have been lost through a too precipitate destruction of the scoring card when everything seemed to be going the wrong way. Every player should remember that it is indeed a perfect card that is without a blemish, and that on the other hand there are few rounds played by a man who knows anything about the game that are bad all through. But some men, because they have the misfortune to be debited with a couple of 8’s in the first four or five holes, forthwith give up the ghost and rend their cards into small pieces with many and varied expressions of disgust. Thereafter they play well, and at the conclusion of the match are inclined to think that they were rather in too much of a hurry to be out of the competition in its early stages. If they had made a fine card for fourteen or fifteen holes from the beginning, they might have taken two 8’s towards the end much less seriously to heart. They would have said to themselves that at all events there were many very fine holes, and the misfortunes which came later were not sufficient to spoil their chances of success. Well, then, when these annoyances happen near the beginning, why not take a philosophical view of them and say that as they had to come it was best that they should come quickly and be done with, and then go on playing hole after hole coolly and properly until at the end it is found that the early misfortunes have been amply retrieved? I am aware that this is very simple advice, and that it appears like a string of platitudes, but it is extremely sound and yet it is ignored on every medal day. Never, never tear up your card, for golf is indeed a funny game, and no man knows what is going to happen when it is being played. There are numberless historic instances to support this counsel, but I will quote only one which came under my personal observation recently, and which to my mind is one of the most remarkable of all. It occurred at a London club. Six players were left in the final round for a cup competition, and the conditions of playing in this final were that a medal round should be played on two different Saturdays. On the first Saturday three of the players tore up their cards, and so only three remained to fight out the issue on the second Saturday. On this occasion one of the remaining three tore up his card very early, and soon afterwards a second did so, each being unaware of the other’s action, the third player being likewise ignorant of the fact that his rivals had disappeared from the contest, and that now, being the only man left in, he could make any return he liked and become the possessor of the cup. Presently he also fell into grievous difficulties, and was on the point of tearing up his card like the others, when the player who was marking for him stayed his hand. He had some idea of what had happened, and, bad score as his man’s was, he insisted on its being completed, with the result of course that he was hailed as the winner of the tournament. He at all events would for the rest of his golfing days respect the moral which I have here endeavoured to convey; and what must have been the reflections of the other competitors who threw up the sponge, when they discovered afterwards that if they had kept plodding along they would still have had an excellent chance!

Similarly in match-play competitions, do not get into the way of thinking that your chance is hopeless just because your opponent becomes two or three up on you, or even more than that, early in the game; and, above all, do not alter your style of play in consequence. Nothing pays like your own best and steadiest game and a stolid indifference to all the brilliant things that your opponent is doing. It is unlikely that he will keep on doing them all through the game, and when the reaction comes you will speedily make up the leeway. There are many ups and downs in a game of golf; and when the players are at all evenly matched, and neither has lost his head, early differences have a way of regulating themselves before the game is very far advanced. No doubt it is disconcerting to be three down after only three have been played; but are there not fifteen still to come? But it often appears that an even greater danger awaits the inexperienced golfer than that of funk when things are going against him, in that he is too frequently apt to become careless when he has obtained a trifling advantage. Never slacken your efforts when you are two or three holes up, but continue to play with all your might and with an extreme of cautiousness until at last you are one more up than there are holes still to play, for not until then are you sure of victory. When a man has once held a good lead, but by playing carelessly has allowed his opponent to get on level terms with him again, the moral effect upon him is usually extremely bad. When this has happened he is inclined to regard himself not as still on equal terms with his opponent, but as having suffered a great loss and being in grave danger of defeat. And this feeling is the prelude to actual defeat and the bitter self-accusations that must inevitably follow. I may have seemed to labour these simple points, but every old golfer will bear me out in saying that a proper regard for the essence of this advice is the first necessity for the man who covets honours in the golfing world.

I say that all golf is the same, and no matter whether it is match or medal play, the simple object is to hole out each time in the fewest number of strokes; but the fact that a single bad hole counts far more heavily against you in a medal round, where all the strokes are added together at the finish, than in match play, where the bad hole is simply one of eighteen, and in which there is only one man to be beaten, of whose performances you are a spectator, instead of an invisible field this difference generally calls for a change in tactics, particularly on the part of the player who knows to a nicety his own capabilities and limitations. Score play is not, of course, so generally interesting as match play, and for this reason will never be so popular; but from my point of view it is the best golf and the best test of golf; indeed, in these respects I think there is really no comparison between the two systems. Score play tests the qualities of both the golfer and the sportsman. If he makes a bad hole and drops two or three to bogey, he must not lose his temper, which proceeding is both useless and fatal, but must screw up his determination, and realise that if he can snatch a stroke from bogey at the next two or three holes, all will be just as well as ever. He must always be hopeful. If we never made a bad hole, were never set any difficult task, always did just what we tried to do well, what then would be the use of playing golf? We should very soon ask ourselves this question, and as there would be no satisfactory answer to it, we should cease to play. The difficulties and the annoyances of golf are after all the things that make the game so attractive and render it so subtly fascinating.

But all the same, when you are playing a medal round in a competition, give due consideration beforehand to this overwhelming fact, that bad holes do tell more heavily against you than in match play, and that when they are made they are not over and done with, but are on permanent record as faults to be atoned for before the round is completed. When the score player sends his ball into a bunker, takes two to escape, and holes out in eight strokes instead of in five, his punishment is not completed at this stage, as in match play. The case is held over in view of what his future conduct may be. He is, in fact, ordered to come up for judgment if called upon. Now, to avoid the pain and anxiety of all this, I suggest to the player who takes out a card in a score competition, that he should make up his mind at the beginning of the round that from the first hole to the finish he will be more than usually cautious. By this I do not mean to say that he should always play the strict safety game, for the man who invariably plays for safety and nothing else will soon find his card running up very high. Certain risks must be taken; but do not accept the very doubtful risks. In match play, I say always play the bold game. Go for everything that you can. If there is a bunker somewhere about the limit of your best possible carry, go for it. If you have a long putt for the hole, give the hole a chance, and either be in or beyond. But I do not suggest that these things should also be done in score-play competitions. If the hole is guarded by a bunker, and you have reason to fear that you cannot carry that bunker, it is in these circumstances a thousand times better to play short than to take the risk of putting your ball into it and making a serious blot upon your card. Similarly, when on the putting green, and there is a long distance between your ball and the hole, bring your mind to realise that it is really of less importance that you should hole out in one stroke than that you should do so in not more than two, and therefore concentrate your whole energies on placing yourself dead for the second putt. Therefore I say, accept a risk now and then when there is a fairly good prospect of success, and when the reward for it will be commensurate with the danger that was incurred.

The last-named is an important clause. The course should be studied hole by hole for medal play, and the competitor should come to an exact understanding with himself as to the things that must be done and what things need not be done. Thus it frequently happens that a player, seeing a bunker some distance in front of him but yet not quite out of his range, goes for it as a matter of course. Obviously he must incur a certain amount of risk, and it may happen that even if he carries it in safety he may not be better off at all than if he were ten or fifteen yards on the playing side. In either case it may be an easy shot to the green, and it may even happen that of the two the longer one would be the easier for this particular golfer. But it is quite likely that he never took any account of that when taking the risk of the bunker. Now this man is to be remonstrated with, for, with the best intentions, he has displayed not courage but folly. He must realise that all bunkers are not of necessity to be carried with long shots. If all golfers played the same game, and always their best game, and, moreover, if all bunkers were placed in the proper places for bunkers, then it would be their duty to go for them every time. But either through the very good or the very bad shots that have gone before, we find that these carries vary very much, and, besides, the bunkers on all courses are certainly not placed exactly where they ought to be, and so for reckoning up the proper mode of play in order that the hole may be captured in the fewest possible number of strokes, they can sometimes for all practical purposes be disregarded.

A golfer is often in an anxious state of mind when the day of a competition in which he wishes to do well arrives, and he is painfully conscious that he is completely off his play with one or other of his clubs, and has an abiding fear that it will bring him to grief. When he feels like this about the club, it will probably do so. Now the question is, whether at this crisis he shall take out a new one with which he is entirely unfamiliar and trust to luck with it, or put his faith once more in the instrument which of late has repeatedly spoilt his game. He is usually advised that in such circumstances he should not indulge in any risky experiments, and that it is madness to take a new and untried club out with him when it is more or less imperative that he should play one of his best rounds. But I am not by any means sure that this advice is well founded. No golfer plays well with a club in which he has completely lost confidence. It may not be the fault of the club at all; but there is the fact. On the other hand, the player is always possessed of a certain amount of hope when he takes a new implement in his hands. He has convinced himself beforehand, or at least ought to have done, that its points are just what he most admires, and that he is likely to do well with it. And so he probably will, even if it is only for a round or two. It is the confidence trick again. What I suggest, therefore, is that when this grave uncertainty exists about the kind of performance that will probably be made with one of the articles in the bag, and there is a new and good substitute ready at hand, the latter should not be disregarded because of a kind of instinct that in a big fight it is best to stick to the old weapons. Take the new one out with you, but do not call it into service for the first hole or two. During this preliminary stage give the old but disappointing favourite another chance to show that it will not desert you in the hour of need; but if it fails to rise to the occasion and you blunder with it during the play at the first and second holes, pass sentence upon it forthwith and relegate it finally to your bag. Then at the third hole let the new one have its trial. Over and over again have I found this method succeed most wonderfully, and I am a particular believer in it in connection with putters. A golfer may have been putting badly for a long time, but directly he takes a new putter in his hand he feels that a great change for the better has been effected, and forthwith he begins to astonish himself by holing out from almost anywhere, or at least always getting his ball dead the first time. There is no accounting for these things. They seem very absurd. But there they are, and no doubt it will be agreed that a medal or a cup is worth a new putter any time.

I do not believe in any sort of training for important golf matches. It is not necessary, and it generally upsets the man and throws him off his game. If he is a smoker let him smoke all the time, and if he likes an occasional glass of wine let him take it as usual. A sudden stoppage of these luxuries causes a feeling of irritation, and that is not good for golf. The game does not seem the same to you as it was before. For my part I am neither a non-smoker nor an abstainer, and I never feel so much at ease on the links and so fully capable of doing justice to myself as when smoking. But at the same time I believe in the most complete moderation. Only by the constant exercise of such moderation can that sureness of hand and eye be guaranteed which are absolutely necessary to the playing of good golf. On one occasion when I had a championship in view I stopped the tobacco for a short period beforehand, and I am bound to confess that the results seemed excellent, and perhaps some day I may repeat the experiment. But there was nothing sudden about the abstinence in this case, and by the time the big days came round I had become thoroughly accustomed to the new order of things, and the irritation had passed away. However, these are matters which every man may be left to decide for himself according to his own good common sense, and the only object I had in introducing them was to counsel the avoidance of sudden whims and freaks, which are never good for golf.

Another question is how much or how little golf should be played beforehand when a man desires to give himself the best chance of playing his best game on a certain specified day. That depends largely upon how much golf he is in the habit of playing in the ordinary course. If he is a man who plays regularly, almost every day when it is fine, I think he will generally do far better for himself by abstaining altogether for a day or two before the competition. Then, when he goes out to play in it, he will experience a zest and keenness which will be very much in his favour. There is no danger that in this brief period of rest he will have forgotten anything that he knew before, but, on the other hand, he will have a greatly improved capacity for taking pains, and every stroke will be easy to him. His confidence will be refreshed. If he continues to play his round or two rounds every day right up to the date of the competition, he will undoubtedly be “over-golfed,” will have a great tendency to fall into errors, and will be generally careless. But if the would-be prize-winner is a man who has usually to content himself with week-end golf, it would be all in his favour if he could put in a day or two of practice before taking part in the big event. There will be no possibility of his becoming stale by so doing.

When a competitor has the choice of playing his round either in the morning or the afternoon, I strongly advise him to select the former and get the thing over as soon as possible. I am positive that his chances of success are usually greater when he does so, especially if, in case of his electing to play in the afternoon, he has nothing particularly to occupy his mind and attention in the interval except his prospects in the forthcoming contest. Golfers are freshest and keenest in the morning, their bodies and limbs are most vigorous and anxious for work, and a very important consideration their eyes are most to be depended upon. And it is not an unimportant consideration that there is no indigestible lunch to interfere with the perfect ease of mind and body which are necessary to the making of a good card.

But often, particularly in the case of important open competitions, the times of starting are decided by lot, and the competitor, on arriving at the course, finds that he has to accept the disadvantages of a late draw, and must endure a period of waiting for his turn to tee up. It is best to dispose of these wearisome periods not in hanging about the tee or in the vicinity of the club-house, but by going out with one of the early couples, watching their methods, and making note of the exact manner in which their best holes are played. If the course is a strange one, the information which the watcher thus derives will be invaluable to him when he comes to play his own round, for he will now be possessed of the most excellent hints as to difficulties which demand special efforts to avoid, and of particular strokes which it is in the highest degree necessary to play well. Not until he has watched the play of others in this manner will the enormous significance of the position of a particular bunker be made clear to him; he will discover the great danger of being short with certain strokes, and of overrunning the green at various holes. By thus watching other competitors’ play he will probably learn more about the nature and peculiarities of the course and the way it is playing on this particular occasion, than if he were doing a round with his own clubs. Therefore, if there is time to be killed, this is most decidedly the way in which to kill it, and I may add that it is the method which I myself adopt on every possible occasion. I know that in championships and tournaments I have reaped great advantage in watching closely the play of my fellow-competitors, their triumphs and their failures, while waiting for my own turn to begin.