The Soul of Golf

by P. A. Vaile

If in the drive the whole weight and strength of the body, from the nape of the neck to the soles of the feet, are not transferred from body to ball, through the minute and momentary contact of club with ball, absolutely surely, yet swiftly—you top or you pull or you sclaff, or you slice, or you swear.

It is almost unnecessary to tell any golfer that the whole weight of his body is not thrown at his golf ball, for this, in effect, would produce a terrific lunge and utterly destroy the rhythm of his stroke.

Here is another remarkable passage—"and as to that mashie shot where you loft high over an abominable bunker and fall dead with a back-spin and a cut to the right on a keen and declivitous green—is there any stroke in any game quite so delightfully difficult as that?" and my answer is "Certainly not, for there is no such stroke in golf." When one puts a cut to the right or to the left, one has no back-spin on the ball. The back-spin is only got by following through after the ball in a downward direction, and as to a mashie approach with a cut to the right—well, the cut on a golf ball in a mashie stroke is in practical golf always a cut to the left, which produces a run to the right. The shot as described by Mr. Haultain simply does not exist in golf. It probably is a portion of the mystery of golf which he has not yet solved.

Then we are told

... not only is the stroke in golf an extremely difficult one—it is also an extremely complicated one, more especially the drive, in which its principles are concentrated. It is, in fact, a subtile combination of a swing and a hit, the "hit" portion being deftly incorporated into the "swing" just as the head of the club reaches the ball, yet without disturbing the regular rhythm of the motion.

This again is another of the mysteries of golf, and a mystery purely of the inventive brain of the author. The drive in golf is played with such extreme rapidity that the duration of impact does not last more than one ten-thousandth of a second, yet we are asked to believe that the first portion of the stroke is a swing, but in, say, the five-thousandth of a second it is to be changed to a hit. Could the force of folly in alleged tuition go further than this?

We now come to an absolutely fundamental error in the golf stroke, an error of a nature so important and far-reaching that if I can demonstrate it, any attempt on the part of its author to explain anything in connection with the golf stroke mechanically, physiologically, psychologically, logically, or otherwise, must absolutely fall to the ground. We are told "the whole body must turn on the pivot of the head of the right thigh bone working in the cotyloidal cavity of the os innominatum or pelvic bone, the head, right knee and right foot remaining fixed, with the eyes riveted on the ball."

Now, put into plain English this ridiculous sentence means that the weight of the body rests upon the right leg. It is such a fundamental and silly error, but nevertheless an error which is made by the greatest players in the world in their published works, that I shall not at the present moment deal with the matter, but shall refer to it again in my chapter on the distribution of weight, for this matter of the distribution of weight, which is of absolute "root" importance in the game of golf, has been most persistently mistaught by those whose duty it is to teach the game as they play it, so that others may not be hampered in their efforts to become expert by following false advice.

Further on we are told, "in the upward swing the vertebral column rotates upon the head of the right femur, the right knee being fixed, and as the club head nears the ball the fulcrum is rapidly changed from the right to the left hip, the spine now rotating on the left thigh-bone, the left knee being fixed." Of course, I do not know on what principle the man who writes this is built, but it seems to me that he must have a spine with an adjustable end. None of the famous golfers, so far as I am aware, are able to shift their spines from one thigh bone to another. Moreover, to say that "the vertebral column rotates upon the head of the right femur" is merely childish unscientific nonsense, for it is obvious to any one, even to one who does not profess to explain the mystery of golf, that one's spine cannot possibly rotate within one, for to secure rotation of the spine it would be necessary for the body to rotate. This, it need hardly be pointed out, would be extremely inconvenient between the waggle and the moment when one strikes the ball.

We are told that in the downward swing "velocity of the club in the descent must be accelerated by minute but rapid gradations." For one who is attempting to explain the mystery of golf there could not possibly be a worse word than "gradations." The author, in this statement, is simply following an old and utterly obsolete notion. There is no such thing as accelerating the speed by minute gradations. Quoting James Braid in Advanced Golf, from memory, he says that you must be "hard at it" from the very moment you start the stroke, and even if he did not say so, any golfer possessed of common sense would know that the mere idea of adding to the speed of his golf drive by "steps," which is what the word "gradations" implies, would be utterly futile. The futility of the advice is, however, emphasised when we are told that these gradations come from "orders not issued all at once, but one after another—also absolutely evenly and smoothly—at intervals probably of ten-thousandths of a second. If the curves are not precise, if a single muscle fails to respond, if the timing is in the minutest degree irregular—the stroke is a failure. No wonder it is difficult."