My thoughts and memories of The Masters
Ah ...... April. Time for The Masters! A perfectly run golf event which sets the standard for all the rest of them.
With the golf ball going prodigious distances when struck by good players, Augusta National has responded with enormous changes to its hallowed golf course. It is now 7445 yards long, up about 700 yards in the last twenty years.
Those changes, not to mention similar ones to The Old Course at St. Andrews, raise fundamental questions in my mind and probably yours. Is it good that technology is changing the game so very much and making courses “respond?” I rather doubt it.
Now back to Augusta. The primary stated goal of lengthening the course was to bring the original, intended landing positions, back into play, with the advent of new and longer golf technology. We will see this month whether that has happened. Palmer has supported the changes for the reasons given. I think Nicklaus still has doubts about the actions taken.
For me, the precious times each year were early on Sunday mornings on the back nine, when players and gallery were just arriving. I would slip under the ropes, and walk straight down the middle of the closing nine holes and let my mind wander. I would remember key moments. I would imagine how I might play the shots. I would see what the field would confront, knowing that this stretch sets up, almost inevitably, as the scene of drama, tragedy, achievement . . . “great stuff”, as the English say.
I would always stop at the spot where I imagined Hogan played his three iron on number ten. A hook lie into a green tipped towards the left with the hole tucked to the right near a bunker. (Today it is a mere seven iron for the top half of the field – what a shame!) And what shots Hogan played, time in, and time out at Augusta? I visualize that scene more meaningfully and graphically than his famous one iron on the 18th at Merion, which we all are so familiar with.
I would not walk out to the 12th green, but I would revisit those precious days that Nicklaus came through for his final win in 1986. He had birdies galore until he arrived at the 12th. I was the Rules official, standing behind the green, alone. Up came his ball, a bit long, and then a chip leaving him 6 feet above the hole. He stroked his first putt and I thought he pushed it. It stayed right. He tapped in and headed toward the 13th tee. As he went past me, he looked me in the eye and said: “Spike Mark”. I said nothing, looked away and wondered whether I had just witnessed the end of a heroic, but failed challenge. Of course, I certainly had not – that miss may have stimulated his miracle at age 46. His son on the bag, and at the winner’s ceremony, tears filling out his eyes.
Hole 14 at Augusta National is uniquely challenging, but rarely discussed. Amen Corner and holes 15 and 16 seemingly get most of the press’s attention. The truth is that the tee shot is very demanding on 14. The landing zone tilts right, but the hole bends left! So, one lays back or else takes the risk of hitting a hook (if right handed) which can get out of control. This is exactly what happened to Crenshaw one year, but he found a tiny opening, struck a miracle shot, made a birdie, as I recall, and went on to win. Again, “good stuff”.
When I stopped to contemplate the 14th green, it was scary. With the flag always back, a shot coming up short leaves one with a fifty footer. An approach putt from there is superb if it winds up 15 feet from the hole! One furious and well known player, who was emptying his locker after defeat, challenged me in anger, to go back out to fourteen and count the number of players, “the best in the world”, he reminded me, whose balls actually stayed on the green. “5%”, he predicted. “Unfair!” So, I went back out there. He was correct. It was virtually impossible to get a ball to remain on the green if one got the ball up. Fair? Reasonable? Same for all players? Not sure how I came out on that one.
I would stop and marvel at the 16th green, so demanding to get it right, even with a mere six iron. The Nicklaus putt from low left to up right, to wipe out Weiskopf. Remember that one? There was also Tom Watson who whistled it 8 feet above the hole from the tee and proceeded to four putt. Really! I watched it happen.
I would stand by the left bunker on 18, wondering how Sandy Lyle could have ever launched a seven iron over the bunker edge, much less land on the putting surface and win. There are so many memories at Augusta. Seve hitting it into the water on 15, Weiskopf scoring double digits on 12, Venturi losing to Burke, and on and on.
We each have our own memory lane – a private, personal path which is uniquely our own. My memories of Augusta qualify. But I do find myself sharing them, as I have done today, which gives me great pleasure.
