Taking care of distance

3/16/01

At the heart of the USGA’s opposition to nonconforming drivers like the ERC II is a concern about distance. Unless limits are placed on technology, the argument goes, new equipment will allow golfers to hit the ball farther and farther, old courses will become obsolete, new courses will have to be 8,000 yards long, and the game will generally become slower, more expensive and less enjoyable.

Many golfers are concerned about distance. Jack Nicklaus for one. But when I saw him recently, I told Jack that he doesn’t have a distance problem -- he has a memory problem. I reminded him that in 1963 he won a long drive contest with a blow of 341 yards.

"And 17 inches," he replied. Then he pulled from his pocket the money clip he won for that feat, all those years ago. And he did it with an old, wooden-headed MacGregor driver.

Despite Jack, the fact is that golfers -- ordinary golfers as well as tour pros -- are hitting the ball farther than golfers did in 1963. The current battle is over nonconforming drivers. The next battle will be over golf balls. But often overlooked in the debate is the effect of another factor: fairways.

The concept of the Stimpmeter as we know it today was invented in 1935. I redesigned it and christened it the Stimpmeter -- the original idea came from a fellow called Eddie Stimpson -- and we started using it to measure green speeds at the USGA in 1977. It’s a simple device -- basically a ball is placed in a notch at the top end of a grooved yard stick-like device about three feet in length. By slowly raising the end of this device, gravity will pull the ball from the notch at the same angle every time, and it will roll down the Stimpmeter. This provides for a constant speed when the ball rolls onto the green. The distance the ball rolls on a flat portion of the green provides a measure of the speed of the green.

In 1977, an average green speed for courses that were measured in 35 states around the country was about 6.5 (meaning the ball rolled six feet, six inches). A fast green was 8.5. We measured the greens at Oakmont at 10, which was way faster than anything else around. Times have changed -- today, an average green speed for a top-level competition is about 10 to 11. And three years ago, we measured the speed of the fairways at the U.S. Open, and they were 6.5 -- as fast as the average greens of 1977! In other words, fairways are much better conditioned and much faster than they’ve ever been, and that too has had a major effect on distance.

Next week we’ll discuss distance further, specifically the pros and cons of putting limits on club and ball technology.

________________________________________________________________

In my last column on golfdigest.com I outlined the four potential options to resolve the problems facing the USGA and the R&A regarding their differences over nonconforming drivers. The USGA, which places a limit on a clubface’s "Coefficient of Restitution" (COR), says such clubs violate the rules of golf. The R&A says they don’t. In our online poll, the first option -- applying the letter of the law, allowing no "spring-like effect" -- was the most popular, getting almost half the votes. The fourth option -- having no restrictions on Coefficient of Restitution -- wasn’t far behind. Most golfers, it seems, want all or nothing -- they have little interest in the two compromise options in between.

 

This column appeared on golfdigest.com where Frank contributes on a weekly basis. Check it out every Saturday.