Dear Industry Colleague
What a fantastic month we have had. A glorious victory in the Solheim Cup at Gleneagles never looked likely, and in fact looked likely to be yet another near miss. I am very fond of our great Americans friends and they are without doubt our closest allies, but it does grate a bit when their victory celebrations have to include the ghastly chants of U-S-A, U-S-A. As the finely balanced match entered its final hour, the game seemed likely to end in a narrow victory for the American team. I was bracing myself for the horrid chants. Bronte Law and Suzann Pettersen had other ideas and showed great bottle in the toughest of situations to close out the respective wins. Great theatre, great telly and a wonderful boost to golf in Europe. This excellent event has done much to energise the men’s game, as well as encouraging women and girls - quite brilliant. I was very sad to learn of the passing of Brian Barnes. Barnsey was a storming golfer with no fear and an exquisite game, beating Jack Nicklaus twice in the same day in the Ryder Cup. Barnsey was a controversial figure. He liked to smoke and drink, and famously hit his ball into the hospitality tent at the Four Stars event at Moor Park where he proceeded to down a pint before hitting his next shot. Smoking and drinking have since been banned on the tour and whilst there are obvious health hazards with both, he was able to show that his rebellious nature, great personal charm and wonderful golf game could all be rolled into one big ball of fun. He was hugely encouraging to thousands of golfers who liked the way he played and lived, which helped to diminish golf’s stuffy image. I liked him enormously and he will be greatly missed.
Moving the BMW PGA Championships to September was a controversial move, engineered between the PGA Tour and the European Tour. It allowed the USPGA Championships to take an earlier seat in the calendar and also for the American Tour to conclude earlier with their gloriously rich Fedex Cup. The advantage of the US Tour wrapping up its main events earlier in the calendar is that it frees up US stars to visit Europe and beyond. Patrick Reed and Billy Horschel both produced excellent displays at Wentworth.
The event itself was a cracker. Ernie Els’ redesign has now finally bedded in with all number of slight re-adjustments to perfect the playing surfaces, approaches and angles. Kenny Mackay, the head greenkeeper and his team have done a brilliant job in producing a course in near perfect condition for this fantastic event. Risk and reward are all part of the challenge, especially on the last two holes when those chasing birdies and eagles are often slain by their own desire and a slight miscalculation or mishit. No such problems for Danny Willett, who fought off a very powerful challenge from Jon Rahm, seizing the second most important win of his career.
As we look to the future, I have had a huge amount of correspondence supporting my application to lead England Golf over the next two years. Sadly, not much has been heard from the powers that be in Woodhall Spa. I fear they may not like the medicine, even if they acknowledge that they have a problem. Our lead article - Golfing Relevance for the 21st Century - highlights further how golf could be better managed than at present with good leadership and an executive not hampered by the heaviest ball and chain in sports administration. Let’s hope some of these ideas can be implemented by whoever takes the helm at England Golf.
Best wishes, Colin Jenkins
