Innehållsförteckning för Apr 2023 - Issue 407 från Golf Australia

There is a new event on the ISPS Handa PGA Tour of Australasia calendar for 2023. The National will be played at The National Golf Club’s Moonah Course on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula from March 30 to April 2. The event will be the finale for the PGA Tour of Australasia’s 16-event season with a purse of $200,000 on offer. Beyond the opportunities on offer for the field, the event, which has been confirmed for the next three years as part of the schedule with a hope to become a Tour Championship of sorts, gives one of the top courses in the country a chance to shine on a big stage. The Moonah layout – designed by Greg Norman and Bob Harrison – is one of three courses on The National’s…

You won for the first time on the Asian Tour, were suspended by the PGA Tour, and axed from LIV Golf after one event. How do you reflect on everything that happened to you last year? It was a very interesting year, even going further back than that, over the last year and a half, two years. I turned pro a week after the Masters in 2020 and everything was going great. I got seven exemptions on the PGA Tour, played four and then had to forgo the rest to have hip surgery. I spent six months rehabbing, got myself ready and came back to play Q-School. We got to the final stage and I pulled a muscle in my elbow right before I teed off. I finished, like, 115th…

It was the moment Australian golf changed forever. In rain and near darkness Adam Scott found the bottom of the cup at the par-4 10th for a birdie three to claim the sudden death play-off and more importantly The Masters Tournament and Australia’s first-ever green jacket. Scott’s iconic primal scream of “C’mon Aussie” when his birdie dropped at the 72nd hole with Marc Leishman in the background and Ian Baker-Finch’s “From Down Under to on top of the world” in the commentary box echoed the importance of the moment for Aussies everywhere. For years, Augusta National had taunted our best players who did their valiant best, yet at every opportunity came up short of golf’s most famous article of clothing. There was Jim Ferrier, an early pioneer for Australians in…

It is golf’s moment of truth. That split second when the clubhead smacks into the back of the ball and, hopefully, comes out of the centre of the clubface. If your grip, set-up, takeaway, backswing and downswing are in good order, you should be in a great position to make a powerful strike at the ball, like Adam Scott is doing here. Scott is one of the game’s finest iron players and there are some key points to note about his perfect impact here. • As the club meets the ball, Scott’s hands are ideally slightly past the ball, with the shaft tilted toward the target.• The clubhead will strike the ball an instant before hitting the turf. As the iron swing creates a downward blow, most shots should produce…

Mizuno have ushered in a deeper focus on its premium golf ball line in 2023 with its new RB Tour and RB Tour X models that have been specifically geared towards the next generation of Tour and elite golfers. Research and Development (R&D) teams in Japan and America worked in concert to develop the new offerings that the brand calls “Our most tested Tour Performance balls ever”. Ninety-nine prototypes were put through the most detailed testing Mizuno have undertaken on a golf ball to eventually deliver the soft feeling golf balls that both offer a high launch, low spin driver flight combined with a flatter short iron and wedge trajectory. “The ultimate difference with the new RB Tour has been the time spent working on the prototypes – three years…

BELLARINE PENINSULA • VICTORIA The past 20 years have been a bullish period for golf on Victoria’s Bellarine Peninsula. New courses, extensively remodelled layouts and the world-class VicOpen Championship have put the peninsula on the global golfing map. Portarlington is one of the region’s long-established clubs and in recent years it has emerged as a major player in the elevation of the Bellarine as a ‘must-visit’ for golfers near and far. The club celebrated its centenary in 2009 but it has improved significantly since then and in January this year it debuted at No.63 in Golf Australia magazine’s Top-100 Public Access Courses ranking. As I noted in that ranking: “Overlooked and underrated for several years, this Bellarine Peninsula gem makes its debut appearance in the Top-100 Public Access Courses ranking.…

bad BRENDAN JAMES Golf Australia Editor In an extraordinary lapse in judgement, the St Andrews Links Trust painted a moustache on the Mona Lisa, stood back and admired its work with pride. Then, when a single photo of the ‘new’ Swilcan Bridge patio found its way onto the internet, the proverbial faecal matter hit the fan. The patio was gone a few days later and replaced with turf. While the Trust certainly had the best of intentions, it quickly learned, golfers – particularly hardcore passionate ones – don’t like change, especially when it comes to the game’s history and its landmarks. The Swilcan Bridge, dating back hundreds of years, is the most famous in the game. Tinkering with it, no matter what the reason, was always going to draw widespread…

A good sports movie is rare. Even rarer is a good golf movie, rarer still is a good golf movie featuring women’s golf. Most unlikely of all is that such a movie existed 70 years ago, and yet we have Pat and Mike (1952). Pat Pemberton (Katherine Hepburn) is a college women’s athletic coach and a talented multi-sport athlete in her own right. What seems like a routine day of work and golf with her overbearing fiancé Collier Weld (William Ching) becomes a turning point in her life when she rebels at his insistence on throwing a money match with a boastful college donor. Observing her obvious talent, the local club pro convinces her to compete in the Women’s National Matchplay Championship. There she is noticed by unscrupulous sports agent…

Leave your jumpers at home, pack the sunscreen and shorts and start planning a tilt at one of two open golf tournaments to be played on Queensland’s beautiful Sunshine Coast. Due to popular demand, Sunshine Coast Classic tournament organisers, Golf Sunshine Coast, have launched two 2023 events – the Winter Classic and the Spring Classic. Registrations are open for the 2023 Sunshine Coast Classics, which will be played over 72 holes across four of the Sunshine Coast’s best courses – Twin Waters, Maroochy River, Noosa Springs and Peregian. The Sunshine Coast Winter Classic will be played from June 12, while the Spring Classic tees off on September 11. Both events are open to all players with a Golf Australia handicap. Each tournament is an individual stableford competition, with daily prizes…

There’s nowhere else in the golfing world quite like it. Lying just south of the internationally renowned Melbourne Sandbelt, Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula has made a global name for itself as a ‘must-visit’ golfing destination boasting a plethora of world class courses. Then, there are the off-course attractions. Foodies will love the equally world-class wineries (celebrated for their chardonnay and pinot noir in particular) and great restaurants where you can indulge in local epicurean delights. It’s also the perfect place to switch off by soaking in steamy hot springs, laze on a beach or relax in a luxury hotel. But if you’re reading this it is the golf that comes first, and every other attraction is the icing on the cake. The Mornington Peninsula boasts the greatest concentration of Top-100 ranked…

Almost every player carries at least one speciality wedge in their bag these days, yet that doesn’t mean it is one design for all as was the case in the past when Tour-style wedges were virtually the only option. Cavity back wedges blending playability and forgiveness have become common place in the category, and Mizuno’s new S23 offering falls right into that mould while still appealing to some Tour players, according to the company. Grain Flow Forged in Japan for exceptional Mizuno feel, the new model takes on the look of a better player wedge at address that hides its game improvement qualities delivered by a toe weighted design achieved through a shorter hosel and heel side cavity. This head design pushes the centre of gravity (CG) from the heel…

The smooth move of Argentinian Roberto De Vicenzo led him to more than 230 wins worldwide, including a victory at the 1967 Open Championship where he managed to fight off golfing royalty in Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus. However, De Vicenzo’s biggest moment in the spotlight came on the hallowed turf of Augusta National in 1968. De Vicenzo was a student of the game, becoming a caddy at his local, Ranelagh Golf Club, on the outskirts of Buenos Aries at eight-years-old. The course would later be named after him as a tribute to his service to the game of golf, not only in the area, but around the globe. Golf in Argentina was largely a minority sport; therefore, De Vicenzo would mainly loop for ex-pat Englishmen. He and his friends picked…

When Bobby Jones captured golf’s ‘Grand Slam’ – winning the U.S Open, The Open Championship, U.S Amateur and British Amateur all in 1930 – he promptly announced his retirement from the sport. It brought to an end one of the most decorated golf careers in history, which include seven Major Championships, as well as six British and U.S Amateur titles, which were classed as majors at the time. Jones then set his sights on his next project; co-designing Augusta National with Dr Alister MacKenzie in the spring of 1931. The course was opened in 1933 and the first event was played the following year, the 1934 Augusta National Invitational, which would later become The Masters. Jones came out of retirement to be the main drawcard for the inaugural event, which…

Golf shoes are far removed from the heavy leather heel rubbing models of the past that while securing a golfer’s stance only added to the leg fatigue experienced after walking 18 holes. Brands such as FootJoy looking at every element of its shoes to not only improve traction but comfort and support, as well as a diverse range of fits and styles. The latest model from the company owning the “No.1 Shoe in Golf” reputation is an update to its HyperFlex for men and women and new HyperFlex Carbon available in men’s. When it comes to the HyperFlex, FootJoy takes the definition of “hyper” as above and beyond normal when it describes the model as offering “hyper power, hyper control and hyper fit”. Power in the golf swing comes from…

There isn’t a golfer on the planet who wouldn’t take some form of improvement in their performance, even if it is a finite amount. Although that desire is the present, the realities of modern life and commitments mean most golfers struggle to even get their regular game in, let alone have the time to practise in the traditional methods. Training aids from companies like SKLZ offer not only guided practise, but as these two products from the range show, the ability to work on your game anywhere. The Power Precision Swing Trainer is designed to help fast track gains in distance and accuracy wherever you are with enough space to make a golf swing motion. Featuring a moulded grip to help with one of the absolute fundamentals of the game,…