The Soul of Golf

by P. A. Vaile

On the same page the author says: "If the eyes look up before the ball is hit, the muscles do not receive the proper orders to hit, and the most important part of the stroke is done blindly. That is my theory"; and a most remarkable theory it is too. The muscles received their proper orders to hit at the moment the stroke was begun, and lifting the eyes a moment before impact would not affect the stroke if the head remained in the same position. Lifting the eyes is in nearly every case, as I have already pointed out, an action following on lifting the mind. The mind has been allowed to come off the stroke because the player's mental picture of the stroke has been completed long before the physical act. In other words, he has got ahead of his stroke. Then his head comes up, which of course is fatal to good golf.

It is a very remarkable circumstance that the attempted analysis by the author of The Mystery of Golf shows clearly that he has entered upon his task with but a very faint idea of sport generally, and he is in this respect much handicapped in his efforts. Let us consider what he has to say with regard to lifting the eye in golf. We read on page 164:

I have sometimes thought that there are two simple and especial reasons for this difficulty of keeping one's eye on the ball: first, because there is nothing to stimulate the attention; second, because one has to attend so long. In cricket, tennis, racquets, as I have shown, the stimulus is extreme; by consequence, your eye follows the ball like a hawk. In billiards there is no stimulus, but you rarely, if ever, take your eye off your ball in billiards. Why? I think because (1) the ball is so near to the eye—and, therefore, the stimulus strong; (2) because the period of time requisite for the stroke is so short. In golf there is no stimulus and the period is always long: you have to look at your ball for more than the whole period of the upward and downward swings.

This remarkable statement shows very clearly, as I have before said, that the author is not practically acquainted with games generally, for lifting the eye is common in practically every game where a ball is used. And it is amazing to find anyone attempting to analyse such a stroke as the golf stroke and at the same time making the statement that "you rarely, if ever, take your eye off your ball in billiards"; and he proceeds to give reasons why one rarely takes one's eye off one's ball in billiards, whereas the game of billiards is an outstanding illustration of the fact that one does take one's eye off the ball. To a very great extent one plays one's stroke at billiards with a most pronounced blind spot every time, in that, just prior to the moment of striking the cue ball, one always looks at the object ball and practically one never sees one's cue on to one's own ball.

Also, it is open to doubt if the golf stroke takes, on the average, from the time the club leaves the ball in its upward swing until the moment of impact, any longer than the billiard player takes in playing his stroke. If it does, the difference is not a matter which need enter into any practical comparison of the strokes.

The curious thing is that in the game instanced by the author as possessing the greater stimulus, that is those games wherein the ball is moving, as in cricket, tennis, racquets, the tendency to lift the eye from the ball is much more pronounced than in those games where the ball is stationary, and this, I think, is by no means unnatural. The operation of the eye is incredibly swift. It catches the flight of the oncoming ball and one plays the stroke to meet it. In playing a stroke at a moving ball, it stands to reason that one has, all other things being equal, less time between the beginning of the stroke and impact than one would have in executing a similar blow where the ball is stationary, for here we have merely the pace of one moving object to deal with, whereas we have in the other case the pace of the two moving objects added together.

It seems to me clear, therefore, that the eye has been able to ascertain much more rapidly what will happen in the case of the two moving objects, and having decided definitely that the stroke must be played in a certain way, the mind has given to the muscles the necessary orders, and the eye has then gone out of business so far as regards that particular stroke, and we get the astonishing result that we find famous players at lawn-tennis playing their strokes with a blind spot of, in many cases, as much as nine inches. This is beyond the region of doubt, and can be proved to demonstration by numerous photographs, so it will be seen that even if there were anything whatever in the suggested comparisons, they are fundamentally unsound in their premises, and therefore absolutely useless for any purposes of practical golf.

We are told at page 166: "If you don't keep your eye on the ball, your stroke is cut short the moment you take your eye off." This is obviously an error. Let us imagine that the golfer has played his stroke perfectly accurately up to within three inches of his ball and then takes his eye away from it, will any practical golfer believe that if he keeps his head still the fact of moving his eye is going to alter that stroke in any way whatever? I think not.

Again we are informed at page 167 that: "It is at all events indisputable that any photograph showing a good follow-through shows the player looking at the spot where the ball was, after the ball had left it; proving that he was really looking at the ball when he hit." Personally, I may say that I have never yet seen a photograph of a good follow-through which did show the player looking at the spot where the ball was after the ball had left it, for photographs of that nature which I have seen showed most clearly that if one desires to absolutely prevent oneself from following through, one of the best methods of doing it is to cultivate the habit of studying the turf after the ball has gone on its way to the hole.

In this we know that we have Vardon entirely with us. His corroboration is valuable for the point is of great and practical importance to the game.