golfweloveit

105 years ago today American amateur Francis Ouimet won the US Open and changed the world of golf. It’s a wonderful story.

Last week this new branding was revealed by the Royal and Ancient along with its Vision for Golf. It all sounds very good talking about modernising and changing perception. In increasing accessibility, inclusivity, embracing change, breaking down barriers, integrity in acting fairly and equally, broadening golf’s appeal while upholding traditions. This last phrase upholding traditions meant to me – we think we need to progress, but within limits.

The R&A’s global role in leading the sport is recognised in its new branding which introduces a secondary palette, the bluey green colour which represents governance, sustainability, commercial, amateur championships, The Open and relationships.

£200 million will be invested over the next 10 years and already the most significant progress is available to be seen. The 2019 Rules of Golf modernise and simplify as will the new world handicap system which will provide a consistent measure if playing ability of golfers of all nationalites, each gender and all playing abilities.

All very good, except for one thing. The branding as The R&A needs to be highlighted because many still think of the organisation as the Royal and Ancient. Which is important on social media. Because if you search on twitter for the Royal and Ancient you will not find what you are looking for. You will find a public house in Palton Bank Road. Wherever that is, it’s not the granite pile in St Andrews.

In March after publishing their joint annual golf ball distance survey, officials at the R&A and USGA declared themselves “concerned”at the significant increase in distance this year. They promised an enquiry and the next step phase just appeared. They want to find out what everyone thinks. Sports Marketing Surveys have provided a questionaire which is at snapsurveys.com. Let me know if you can get into it, because I couldn’t.

This is a tricky issue with Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player in favour of limiting the distance of the ball which they fear will make some courses obsolete. Titelist is likely to take legal action if a so called ‘major ball’ is introduced for all players to play in major championships. I agree with Rory McIlroy that it isn’t just about the ball – it’s also due to the huge improvemtents in top players strength and conditioning that has lead to increases in distance. I’d like to have my say but the survey doesnt seem to work.

Yesterday at the Tour Championship at East Lake Brooks Koepka, the world number two and winner of two majors this year, found out that he was not required by the media. Because nobody had asked to speak to him. So he let the media have it.

”I don’t get asked to do many interviews so I’m not gonna go out of my way to do one. I don’t really care.

You’ve got guys who will kiss up and I’m not gonna kiss up. I don’t need to kiss anyone’s backside, I’m here to play golf, I’m not here to do anything else. A lot of guys are known for the stuff they do off the golf course and who they hang around with, It’s obvious who.

I don’t need to bend over backwards to be friends with anyone in the media but certain guys do that because they want their names written. I’d rather be written about because of my play. Sometimes it sucks, but I’ve started to care less. Come Sunday I won’t forget it when everyone wants to talk to me because I just won, I wont forget.

Well I didnt forget that he won the US Open and the USPGA in magnificent, dominating fashion, I just didnt put it on here because for three months I was busy elsewhere. We appreciate you Brooks Koepka, not least because you learned you came over to play on the European Tour and learned to be a complete golfer. Pete Cowen has done a brilliant job with him. Just look at this swing.

Brooks is currently 2nd in the Tour Championship. If he wins on Sunday he also wins the FedEx Cup and will take over as World number one. Everyone will want to hear from him then.

The tragic news on Monday of the brutal murder on a golf course of European Ladies Amateur Champion Celia Barquin has caused angry shockwaves, not least in her native Spain.

Tommy Fleetwood tweeted this: “I’ve always grown up thinking that a golf course is the safest place in the world to be”.

Yes. But he is a man.

It is a sad reflection of how little society has progressed that even today that many women cannot feel free to do what they want, go where they want because they always live with the threat of male violence wherever they go. Whether this threat is real or imagined it holds women back. As far as women playing golf is concerned, can they do what men do, choose to play in solitude? – “alone with the skylarks”as a contented male member of Royal West Norfolk once described it.

When I was younger I used to go out and practice on a course which had a public right of way through it and I remember one day being startled by three different men interrupting my participation in the sport by mindless – and really annoying questions – “you enjoying your golf then?” “Yes, now do you mind?” another came onto the green picked up my golf ball “you’re playing with Titelist  they’re really expensive, how can you afford them?” and then another watching a drive “I’m surprised you can hit it that far, you’re very slightly built”. I was then told by the assistant professional that they had had the police in earlier that week because of rough sleepers camping out.

Women do not need this. It is not only rude and patronising it is threatening when men creep up out of nowhere. But it also smacks of something which needs to be addressed, and that is that men like these resent women being on their territory and want to disarm them so they give up and go away, they basically want golf to be what many of the public perceive it to be, a single sex sport. But when it comes to a distinguished amateur golfer being murdered on a golf course by a homeless man who was found living there who just wanted to kill, then people must sit up and take notice.

Because it is this, I think, more than anything else that is deterring women participating in golf. The Royal and Ancient realise that the lack of women playing the sport is a big issue not least because of the loss of potential revenue to the industry. They estimate that there are 36.9 million latent female golfers in the world (how this is measured is bewildering).This represents a potential $35 billion to golf. And yet they focus on family participation… England Golf focus on the upbeat. They use words like fun, welcome, support, building confidence, having a laugh and my favourite twee “socialising over a glass of fizz”.

They are getting it wrong.

In order for more women to come and play they need to feel completely safe, secure places across the board in every club. And it is about security. Only the wealthiest clubs can afford to employ buggy driving on course marshals. What is needed is properly supervised, constantly monitored CCTV cameras when women are playing. If this means keeping to a shorter 9 hole course then so be it. It is beholding on everyone to make sure that the golf course is a physically safe area. Spending money on this and telling women it is a safe place to be is what will appeal to women and reassure them much more than dishing out glasses of prosecco.

Rest In Peace Celia Barquin Arozamena.

I’ve been asked the question myself – the why golf? one. When people see someone who doesnt quite fit the natural mould for the game. I increasingly feel that sometimes there is a pull, a force, that draws a diversity of people to the game.

None more so than Valentino Dixon who has spent 27 years in prison for a crime he did not commit and who yesterday had his conviction quashed. During his time in jail he began to draw. A prison guard saw what he was doing and gave him a picture of Amen Corner at Augusta National to copy. And from this he began to draw and colour more and more golf courses. He doesn’t really understand the pull but says it gave him peace. “For some reason my spirit is attuned to this game”.

Valentino’s daughter Valentina began to sell his golf artwork on line to help pay to re-open his case. Golf Digest in America looked in to his story and along with students at Georgetown University who campaigned against his wrongful imprisonment they uncovered shoddy police work, unsafe evidence and unreliable witnesses. Tonight the real perpetrator of the 1991 murder for which Valentino was wrongly imprisoned is behind bars.

The love of Golf had kept him going. l will be interested to see if anyone in the golf community gives back to Valentino for he surely has his place amongst us.

Today singer Ed Sheeran announced two UK venues for 2019 – Leeds Roundhay Park and Chantry Park in Ipswich. Tickets for the four dates are likely to sell out within minutes when they go on sale on AXS.com on September 27 at 10am.

So where else might you catch him? Before performing in Belfast in May he made a planned visit to Ardglass Golf Club. It had been booked months in advance and the club secretary had been sworn to secrecy. But when Ed arrived he was friendly to everyone in the pro shop, selfies were taken and soon word got out on social media and he managed just four holes. So as he has been spotted on golf courses in Brazil and Japan before concerts – notably when he hit Justin Bieber in the face when he tried to hit a shot out of Bieber’s mouth when he was lying down on the turf, really…- it may be worth hanging round the likes of Moortown, Allwoodley or Stoke By Nyland just before. (If the club secretary doesnt warn you off, that is).

Justin Bieber, who this week was spotted singing outside Buckingham Palace, has taken girlfriend Hailey Baldwin to TopGolf here recently while teaching her how to play. And who did I find in the corner of the halfway hut at Sunningdale once? Someone currently on the X Factor who stopped eating the sausage on brown to say  “don’t take me photo, it’s me day off…” I know we’re part of the “pictures or it didn’t happen” age, but what a presumption. Did I have a camera with me and did I want a picture of him anyway?

A major story which was picked up on American natonal newspaper USA Today featured Hawaiian professional golfer Tadd Fujikawa.

Speaking on his Instagram account Fujikawa decided to come out as gay on World Suicide Prevention Day. He is the first male professional golfer to be openly gay, though there have been a number of top professional women golfers on the LPGA tour who are have been openly gay since the 1980s.

Tadd Fujikawa is the youngest player to ever compete in the U.S. Open at Winged Foot in 2006 when he was 15. The next year he made the cut at the Sony Open, becoming the youngest player in 50 years to make the weekend at a PGA Tour event. He is now 27 and today he wrote:

“I don’t expect everyone to understand or accept me,” Fujikawa wrote. “But please be gracious enough to not push your beliefs on me or anyone in the LGBTQ community. My hope is this post will inspire each and every one of you to be more empathetic and loving towards one another.

“I’ve been back and forth for a while about opening up about my sexuality. I thought that I didn’t need to come out because it doesn’t matter if anyone knows. But I remember how much other’s stories have helped me in my darkest times to have hope. I spent way too long pretending, hiding, and hating who I was. I was always afraid of what others would think/say. I’ve struggled with my mental health for many years because of that and it put me in a really bad place. Now I’m standing up for myself and the rest of the LGBTQ community in hopes of being an inspiration and making a difference in someone’s life. Although it’s a lot more accepted in our society today, we still see children, teens, and adults being ridiculed and discriminated against for being the way we are. Some have even taken their lives because of it. As long as those things are still happening, I will continue to do my best to bring more awareness to this issue and to fight for equality. Whether the LGBTQ is what you support or not, we must liberate and encourage each other to be our best selves, whatever that may be. It’s the only way we can make this world a better place for future generations.

Last December won the Hawaii State Open after announcing he was experiencing depression and anxiety.

Fujikawa asserted that he doesn’t want this announcement to focus on him, and hope it helps spread love and acceptance to those in similar situations.

“I can’t wait for the day we all can live without feeling like we’re different and excluded,” Fujikawa said. “A time where we don’t have to come out, we can love the way we want to love and not be ashamed. We are all human and equal after all. So I dare you…spread love. Let’s do our part to make this world a better place.”

I once spoke to a top professional who said this  – “there are no “pink” players on the mens tours and there never will be”. There is now.

In December 2018 English LPGA Player Melissa Reid came out publicly saying that she had stayed in the closet because she was wortied about sponsors reactions. But then began to question why these companies would want to have me represent them “if I cant be my authentic self”. It is odd that the LPGA has quite a number of gay women professionals in its ranks. It began with the great Babe Zaharias . Some are openly gay and others like Meg Mallon just acknowledge the fact that “oh Ive been in a relationship with fellow professional Beth Daniel for 25 years” when she made a Hall of Fame induction speech. Good for both Tadd and Melissa for making things clear. Ive always thought that there are not two sexes there are four.

At the BMW Championship Jordan Spieth’s Tied 57th place slipped him to 31st spot in the FedEx Cup rankings so by one spot he misses out on playing in the Tour Championship.

He said “I was in control of my own destiny and didn’t have it this week. Riding some momentum but my game kind of got a little off”.

As explained in the post below Drama at the BMW Championship, Spieth fails to fulfil a PGA Tour Scheduling Requirement by only playing in 24 events.

He said “I obviously accept whatever fine it is and move on. I try and add one every year but it is kind of tough”.

This unusual situation is a warning for even the highest ranked golfers not to get complacent. It seems to me that the PGA tour are saying that the tour comes first – wheras the European tour have been more accommodating and flexible with their members underlining their “players first” philosophy.