USGA STANDARDS TO BE CONSIDERED

By Dick Sayer

In mid-May, the Golf Association of Philadelphia held its annual Pro-President-Green Chairman-Golf Chairman seminar program, golf tournament and Arnold Palmer Lifetime Service Awards ceremony in Lancaster. ( See related articles in this issue )

The morning program at Bent Creek was moderated by TV golf commentator Steve Melnick, and the discussion panel consisted of Trey Holland, President of the USGA, Jack Connelly, President of the PGA of America, Dick Rugge, Director of Testing for the USGA, and Ron Prichard, a golf course Architect specializing in the restoration of golf courses. The subject was 'Non-Conforming Equipment', which continues to be a hot topic throughout the world of golf, and there was a lot of discussion about the USGA’s standards for golf clubs and balls. It was emphasized that the performance limitations established by the USGA and the R&A are intended to keep today’s engineering technology from drastically altering the game of golf, as we know it, and making our existing courses obsolete.

While the discussion was fascinating, it occurred to me that the USGA has concentrated most of its efforts on clubs and balls, when in fact there are lots of other elements that have an impact on the game, but go un-regulated and uncontrolled. Here are some of my suggestions for standards that the USGA should develop.

Golf Carts

The Scottish don’t acknowledge that golf carts exist; the 'traditionalists' consider them a last resort to be used only when caddies are unavailable, and the people residing in golf communities have made them a 'way of life'. Have you seen some of the turbo charged, high performance, all wheel drive, air conditioned and stereo equipped golf carts that race around the golf communities in Florida, Arizona and California ?

Casey Martin not withstanding, a golf cart with all the options you’d find on a BMW can be a tremendous advantage to the player who has one. On a hot and sultry day, an air conditioned golf cart can mean the difference between running out of gas after 15 holes or finishing the 18 in top-notch form. Your golf cart’s surround sound stereo system can relax you after losing a hole in match play or making a triple bogie, and your on-board refrigerated refreshment center can keep you at the top of your game or destroy your game, depending on what’s in your refreshment center. Finally, there’s the matter of headlights, which in a late afternoon event can mean the difference between finding your ball in the gathering darkness or losing the match because of a lost ball.

The USGA has not developed standards on fully equipped golf carts and their adverse impact on the purity of the game. I think it’s high time that this issue was addressed.

Flag Sticks ( 'Pins' in USGA Terminology )

At one end of the spectrum is Merion Golf Club with their red wicker baskets on the 'pins,' so you can’t tell which way the wind is blowing at the green. In the middle are the courses that use different colored flags to tell you whether the pin is positioned at the front, middle or back of the green; wiffle balls on the flag sticks to tell you the pin position, and reflectors so you can determine distances to the pin with your 'Flash Gordon' laser gun ( Only we older golfers remember who Flash Gordon was ). Finally, at the other extreme, we have the computer based triangulation tracking systems, with overhead monitors installed in golf carts that show the distance to the pin from any place on a given hole. (They also give you the lunch menu at the halfway house, which is one of their more valuable features)

I think it’s time that the USGA took a hard look at the way the design of the 'pins' affects the game of golf. Whatever happened to the old bamboo pole with the numbered flag on top ?

Scorecards and Pencils

You may have trouble relating to this problem, unless you’re an 'pre-computer age' Architect or Engineer who's accustomed to being able to clearly write numbers in the perfect graphic style that we were taught in school. There’s nothing more frustrating to a graphically trained golfer then a scorecard printed on glossy paper stock and a pencil that has all the writing characteristics of an 8 penny carbon steel nail.

Another problem is the size of the boxes in which you’re to enter the score for each hole. Some clubs use up most of the space on the scorecard to show diagrams of each hole, provide a history of the course, list the golf professional, the green superintendent, the course Architect, the rating and the slope, etc. By the time they get all of that business attended to, the box for each hole’s score is a quarter of an inch square, and unless you’ve spent your life repairing watches or building ship models in a bottle, there’s no way you can write the number 10 in a box that small.

The USGA should require that scorecards be printed on matte paper; that pencils be # 2 or softer; and that erasers on golf pencils be banned, because most of them are so dried out that they just smudge the paper anyway. The boxes for each hole should be a minimum of a half an inch square, and for golfers over 60, scorecards should come with one of those cheap plastic magnifying devices, so we can read the rating for each hole.

Golf Bags

Under the USGA’s 'Rules of Golf' we’re only allowed to carry 14 clubs, however, most of the light weight golf bags on the market today are sized to accommodate a maximum of 10, and that doesn’t count your ball retriever and umbrella. I’m not advocating the 'trunks' you see the pros using on tour, but then again they don’t have to carry them around the course. In fact, they don’t even have to carry them from their cars to the first tee.

Golf bags today have so many pockets and compartments, you can accommodate a complete change of clothes, four pairs of golf gloves, your rain suit and Lord knows what else. If left unregulated, the next innovation will be a refrigerated compartment for your lunch and favorite beverage. That would create an 'unfair advantage'.

We need a USGA testing program to develop standards for golf bags that allow us to withdraw a club without spraining our wrists, or worse yet dislocating the caddie’s shoulder when the club grip hangs up in the bag.

PG Viewpoint’s Recommendation