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Follow the Game With the Champions i Jock Tells of Some Famous Tours By JOCK HUTCHISON (Former American Winner of the Britleh Open Championship) The American open champion ship will soon be played at the Oakland Hills Country Club at Detroit. A new experiment was tried this year in having the East qualify at home, and the fest ern players do the same thing, thereby limiting the field of ac tual starters to proportions that will be easily handled. For the last ten years there has been more or less of a mix up at tournament time. I always will insist that my chances were considerably hampered at Sko kie two years ago on account of the qualifying round being so far removed from the actual tourna ment itself. I was one of those who turned in my qualifying round on the first day of the tournament, and if I was ever on edge it was on this occasion. My total of 136 strokes led the field, and I was in a happy frame of mind. It is a pleasant experi ence to realize that you are on edge as championship time ap nrnnnlips Keeping on Edge I was all set for big things, seeing in the offing at least a chance to gather in the national title. Two days intervened be tween my rounds and the tourna ment, but when a downpour of rain spoiled the proceedings on the first day of the championship it made another day to wait. I was like the race horse -that waited too long at the post, and my championship rounds did not resemble in any shape or man ner the first day’s play. Those who played the opening day were not permitted to use the course for practicing purposes, and the time was lost beyond recall. Before any of us got going again our chances of win ning had disappeared. The championship at Inwood lasted a full week last July in the heat of the summer, and the field was well worn out at the finish. It was not until the tie was played off on Sunday between Bobby Jones and Bobby Cruikshank that the tournament was ended. This year the new plan should work out well. All of the seventy odd players permitted to start on the final four rounds, constitut ing the championship proper, will be fresh, and they will have ex perienced no long waits in be tween the testing rounds and the championship. (Jim Barnes will suggest a remedy for your golf faults. Write him care of the sport editor, enclosing stamped envelope, If you want a personal reply.) Dear Mr. Barnes: I have a great fault of hitting the ground back of the ball with my wooden clubs, especially my brassie. I use a fairly flat swing, and keep the weight well back on my right foot with the left arm straight. I shall appreciate any advice that you can give me to help correct this fault. E. B. D. Answer: Allowing the right knee to dip down somewhat on the down swing usually accounts for strik ing the ground back of the ball, and furthermore, is generally an indication that the player is try ing to hit the ball too hard. This, by the way, is one of the common est faults in the game of golf. The player, in his anxiety to get plenty of distance, loses sight of the fact that the way to do it is to make a free swing with the muscles not tensed and tightened up. Tightening up to kill the ball is what causes the ducking down at the knee. Keep your right leg straight and fairly stiff from the ankle to the hip on the back swing, and incidentally don’t get too much of your weight back on it. It ought to carry a majority of the weight on the back swing and at the top of it, but at the same time you want enough weight on the big toe and ball of the left foot to feel a good sense of bal ance from side to side. Keep the right leg fairly stiff until the club head is two-thirds of the way down to the ball from the top of the back swing, and don’t forget what was said about not tightening up the muscles too much. No doubt you do this in a practice swing. Try the same thing in hitting the ball, and you will probably be surprised at the results. * * * Dear Sir: I have been playing golf for several years, and while I fre quently break through 90 I have experienced considerable trouble n keeping my feet on the ground, especially when using wooden clubs. My friends tell me that I would get thirty or forty yards more distance if I could overcome this fault. In making a practice swing I seem to have no trouble of this kind, hut with the hall before me it is differnt. Can you tell what the trouble is and how I can cure it? C. W. H. I presume by difficulty in keep ing your feet on the ground you refer to a tendency to raise up n your toes in making the stroke. This is not an uncommon fault, and where it is somewhat chronic it is generally due to failure to get proper balance in starting the stroke. Sometimes the trouble is aggravated by teeing the ball too far away. The balance of the weight of the body from back to front should be well back on the heels in the address. To insure getting it there it is well to allow just a suspicion of bend in the knees. Of course they are not to be loose and wobbly, but springy, if you understand what I mean. Then in teeing the ball see that it is placed so that you can ad dress it with the club head imme diately back of it, with the upper part of the arms hanging just free of the body, that is—with the elbows no more than four to five inches out. (Continued from Column 2) m Glenn Collett Greatest Woman Star, Says Gene By GENE SARAZEN (American Professional Champion) In again winning the women’s eastern golf championship, a ti tle she had little difficulty in carrying away last year, Miss Glenna Collett has proved herself to be the greatest woman golfer the world has ever known. I know there are many who will dispute this statement. Never theless her record is proof enough of her greatness. It wasn’t her victory at Brae burn recently so much as her scores which convinced me that Miss Collett today is playing bet ter golf than she has ever shown before. She is still a young girl and is constantly improving, there seems to be no limit to her game. Right now she could hold her own with the great ma jority of men stars, amateurs and professionals. Most Women Arm Swingers In her first round at Braeburn the other day she had a 76. Im agine that over a par layout of 72, one of the hardest courses in the country. It was here that Francis Ouimet came into fame. It was on this course Jess Sweet ser blossomed forth as a mighty golfer. And now comes Miss Col lett with a score that only a few of the great army of men stars have beaten. ***'■' * 1W.1UC1U.C 13 tu score so amazingly well because of the tremendous power in her golf swing. Unlike most women golfers, Miss Collett pivots more, and accordingly gets her body into the swing as she goes into the ball. Most women are arm swingers. That is, they hit prac tically without turning the body to any great extent. Miss Collett, too, has a faster back swing than any other wo man. Only Cecil Leitch of those I have seen equaled her in this respect. Of course a fast swing is very hazardous for most golf ers. But the great player gets much of his power by reason of that kind of stroke. Big Chance This Fall Another difference between Miss Collett’s game and that of most other women is that the former is not afraid to whip the club into the ball. She swings at it like any professional would. Her long game has always been magnificent. Where she has been weak is in her short game, and it is in this department of the game where one can slip more strokes faster than anywhere else along the route. I understand that Miss Collett has improved consid erably, however, in this respect within the past year, and if this is the case I cannot see how any one is going to beat her in any tournament this year. Miss Marion HollinB, who won the Metropolitan championship recently, has great power, but lacks the steadiness that charac terizes Miss Collett’s game. If she can chip and putt as well as she drives and plaiys her iron shots, Miss Collett should go through the year 1924 unbeaten. Had she won the national championship last year Miss Col lett would undoubtedly have vis ited England this spring to com pete in the British ladies’ cham pionship. Critics, who are of the opinion Miss Joyce Wethered is the greatest woman golfer would have had an opportunity to com pare the games of these girls. Miss Collett will have a fine chance in the woman’s national championship next fall inasmuch as this tournament is to be held iover her own club course in Provi dence. In the event she is vic torious Britons will probably have a chance of seeing this great girl golfer next year. luring ionr bolt lronbies (Continued on Column 4) Raising up on the toes is some times a proof of pressing, or try ing to hit the ball too hard, and that may be partly the cause of your trouble. Where this is true the player generally mistimes the stroke because of trying to start the club down too rapidly from the top of the back swing. Don’t be in too big a hurry in hitting the ball. The hands should get pretty nearly back down to the level that they occupy in the ad dress before any real hitting ef fort is made. So, in addition to the above pointers about correct balance, try taking it a bit easier. The fact that you swing all right in practice indicates that you are trying to swing too hard. You think you are putting plenty of force into hitting the ball, when most of it is probably being ex pended too soon, and the club head has in reality already reached its maximum speed be fore it gets to the ball. Dear Mr. Barnes: Most every time that I drive off when starting to play I top or slice the ball. What should I do to remedy this fault? Your advice will be very much appre ciated. H. W. D. Answer: Topping the ball is usually caused by raising the head and shoulders, whereas there are many causes for slicing. To rem edy the trouble of topping keep your head still and don’t be in too big a hurry in looking up to see where the ball is going. Possibly the most common cause for slicing is getting the j hands through on the stroke! ahead of the clubhead, and very frequently this comes from try ing to hit the ball too hard. My first suggestion is to get out, whenever opportunity is offered, and practice swinging easier. By that I mean start out at first to hit the ball without any thought of trying to get distance. Take the club back slowly and start it down slowly, gradually speeding it up as it nears the ball, but don’t make any effort to get dis tance; just practice hitting the ball, with a view to trying to hit it cleanly. Then here is another pointer that I think may help. See that you are pivoting correctly, swing the club more around the body as though you were swinging a scytljp, and don’t straighten the body as you start the club back. To pivot right, turn the body at the hips, allowing the left heel to rise from the ground and the left knee to bend partly forward and partly on to the right leg. Meantime keep a fair amount of weight on the ball of the left foot. Keep the left arm as straight as you can in taking the club back, and at the top of the back swing. As the club comes down use the wrists and fore arms to snap the clubhead against the ball. And remember what was said about keeping the head still and not trying to hit too hard. Dear Mr. Barnes: I wish you would give me some pointers on how to play a stroke where the ball finds a cuppy lie, such, for instance, as when it set teles into a small bare spac on the fairway with the grass imme diately in front of and behind it. I would appreciate your advice on the best choice of a club as well as the kind of swing to be used. J. E. D. Answer: Much depends on the condi tions surrounding each individual case of this kind, of course, and the proper selection of a club can be made after examining just what is to be done. However, for general purposes I may say that. it is better always to be on the safe side in such cases by taking a club with plenty of loft, being willing to sacrifice possibly some distance to be sure that you get the ball up and down top or founder it. Where the ground is fairly soft, and the lie not too bad, a midiron, or a spoon, and even a brassie may at times be used, if distance is greatly needed. As to playing the stroke, it is generally advisable to shorten the swing, and make it a little more upright than ordinarily, es pecially where the lie is bad and real difficulty in getting the ball out is presented. Grip the club a little more securely immediately behind the ball. In other words don’t try to cut away the turf back of the ball to get under it. * • * Dear Mr. Barnes: Will you be kind enough to ex plain to me what is meant by put ting wrist snap into the stroke and how it is done? I get very poor distance on my shots, and I am told that failure to put the wrists into the stroke is the rea son for this, but nobody seems to tell me just how this ought / to be done. * B. M. Answer: What your advisers have in mind is action through the wrists and forearms that helps to speed up the clubhead as it nears the ball, increasing the speed pro vided in the general swing at the club. Here is what should take place. When the hands come to the top of the swing the wrists bend in somewhat toward the body just as they would if you raised the club about to a vertical position purely by a wrist and forearm motion from the position in the address without moving the rest of the arms. In other words you might say they are then “cocked” as you would cock the hammer of a gun. They should stay in this relative position to the rest of the arms after the club starts down and until the hands get back to a level with the waist, or maybe a little lower. Meanwhile the hands will have moved to a a point almost in front of the right thigh, or rather just to the right of it. Safety to those in the Car and on the street are facts to take into consideration when driving your car with poor brakes. We will adjust or reline your brakes by mac binary, pains the solid brass tubular rivet. OFFICIAL RAYBESTOS BRAKE SERVICE STATION D. & D. Auto Supply and Machine Shop 3307 ATLANTIC AVENUE Phone: Marine 4694 Atlantic Garage, 12-14-16 So. North Carolina Ave., Atlantic City. Friend Slim— That certain wu some lettur as you wrote to me last week—I he? jest kept laffing ofer it everytime the work gives me a chanst. You must a hed yur noirve wid you whem you kidded Cunstable Hicks abut having sech a cheap badge as to get rusty when he fel in the pond. We hev had plenty of water here lately tu—though it is turable hot today and they du say as folks come her just like flocks o geese when the sun gets hot. Tother nite there was a purty came in here when it was raining cats and dogs and goldfishes. They wus pushing a sport car with a gurl in it. They hed got stuck in the rain leving their car out in front of a movie house and being strong fellers they shoved it around here insted of sending for me as could have gone to them. You know from my other letters we make a spechulty of storing cars so folks won’t hev things stolen out o them or havin the rain do these kind o things. But this feller didn’t know nor none of those with him. I fixed em up, but it was quite a job cause the rain certainly does come down hard when it comes in these showers. Everythin was wet and soaked and I hed to put in two new wires. But they was out fer a good tim and did not ker as long as they got going again. Next tim they’s comin in here to park when they goes to a show in this part o town. When i steps on their old self starter the hum of the motor was like music in the ears of the three kids—both gallants then put up a fight that beats the Walker-Tendler bout all hollow as to who should have the honor of payin the freight for my precious time and away they went—send a couple of more of them homemade cakes—yours till old Miser Skinflint buys a Rolls, GUS.