your voice
I
read with interest your interview with
Stephen Pitt (“Readers’ rumbles about
Golf Australia”, April issue). While it is
obvious not all readers’ concerns can be
raised and responded to, it does seem that
there a few that are more common than
others.
The introduction of the new
handicapping system, for example. We
have taken an old, easily managed simple
system and now made it complicated and
dependent upon a software company. At
what cost did this come? Were there other
alternatives? Couldn’t the old system have
been adjusted to iron out deficiencies
such as small fields and older golfers?
Why did Britain and Scotland reject this
system? The management of all types of
competitive golf including four-ball, threeball etc. have had to be adjusted. Are we
any better off? I know Stephen Pitt raised
the issue of data collection, but this could
have been achieved in other ways.
The Slope system was also introduced
in tandem with the handicapping, but
why was it necessary? It is an American
system set up for their golf culture, not
ours. The vast majority of Australian Club
golfers play mostly at their home course.
Therefore the supposed advantage of
portability is rendered dormant for most
golfers. Add to this the discrepancies in
the actual Slope ratings and the whole
system must come into question. I know
of a number of instances where some
courses are rated more difficult than others
according to the Slope, but this seems
an error in judgement. I have read the
criteria on which the ratings are arrived at,
but there are so many other factors that
come into play. Examples of this include
weather, pace of greens, types and difficulty
of hazards, length of rough, tightness of
fairways etc. Is this one of the reasons why
our Commonwealth cousins rejected this
method of equalisation? On some days in
Scotland you can forget the Slope, because
it is near impossible to play to your handicap
due to the conditions. Under the old system
a fair CCR would not have penalised you for
playing near your handicap.
I would have thought that Golf Australia
would have had far more pressing issues
Letter
of the
Month
to deal with than spend a lot of money and
time on introducing a new handicap system.
With golf club membership declining, other
sports gaining higher profiles and reduced
grants from Government available, urgent
action is needed.
I work in the Sport industry and one of the
major hurdles facing golf administrators
is the entrenched nature of the old club
organisation and its role in the promotion
and growth of the game. Each club is run
by the representatives of its members on
behalf of the members. By and large this
equates to club members looking after
their interests and not those of the game.
It prevents the sport becoming exposed
to a wider youth audience and increasing
not only participation, but interest in the
community both locally and nationally. We
need good young players coming through,
but at the moment they are coming from a
very narrow base. Essentially, those young
people that have a connection already to a
golf club member. What about the scores of
school students out there who would love
to try golf, but have no means of doing it.
The old model of Club Professionals giving
lessons to young golfers where the students
come to them is outdated.
Golf needs a central body to organise,
promote and engender the game to the
next generation. This is what all other wellrun professional sporting bodies in the
country have done, such as the AFL, NRL
and to a lesser extent the A League. They,
like golf, had challenges to overcome,
but took the bit between their teeth and
removed the parochial power bases and
centralised the whole game. In this way
they were able to steer their codes into
more modern practices and remove the
self-interest holding the game back. Soccer
had a greater task in this regard than most,
but has gone a long way to eradicating it
and the results are there to be seen. Can
golf do the same?
Mick Roberts
YOUR VOICE
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More Readers’ Rumbles
I would like to ask why clubs don’t allow
players to share a membership? My wife
is a member of our local club and enjoys
the social contacts she has at the club.
As we can’t afford two memberships,
I pay as I go at other clubs. There are
many times she can’t play due to other
commitments and it would be handy if
I could use her membership and spend
some money at the 19th hole. There
would still only be one player on the
course per membership.
Alan O’Rourke
As Captain of a Golf Club in WA I have had to
deal with the roll out of the new handicap
system & as far as I can see the reason Club
membership is in decline is because now
to get a handicap you do not need to be
a member of a club. The way I see it this is
nothing more than a money-making venture
by Golf Australia. \