Evening star., 1915-12-29
VARDON. GREATEST GOLFER.
A GENIUS AND A PLODDER
OF All Players His Form the Most Perfect
Braid and Taylor Figure Close
to the Nonpareil.

often necessary not to drive straight
down the middle, but to place the tee
shot within certain narrow limit. TO
the right or the left BY placing this
shot exactly right the hole is opened
up for fairly easy second. In playing
with Taylor 1 noticed after every tee
shot that his ball would stop almost
at the spot where he would have walk
ed up and placed it with his hand if he
had been permitted. With that short
half swing he is the most accurate
driver that I have ever seen. 1t was
not with him questio nof yards, but
of feet-1 might almost say inches He
was not nearly so long as Vardon or
| Braid, but no golfer that ever lived is
as accurate when Taylor happens to be
in the proper mood.
Taylor Man of Moods.
Here again he differed from Vardon
and Braid. Their mental state seemed
to be always the same, while Taylor
was a golfer of moods. He is much
more inclined to worry about himself
and his game. If he gets off he is
likely to be badly off, and his game
will vary much more than Vardon's
i will.
This last year, by wonderful golf. he
holes. Then. at the finish. when a
fairly easy IS would have won for
him, he suddenly developed the wrong
mood. went badly off his game, and
took an SO.
| In the 1913 tournament, played at
Holyoke in wind and rain storm.
Taylor started in one of. his confident
| moods. And while conditions were
Ghastly-so bad that even great
golfers were playing many shots far
out of lne-Tayior. in that seventy
two holes. requiring more than 800
shots, played but one ball off the
course into the rough-one ball out
of 200 under conditions that made it
almost impossible to keep the line,
with binding rain beating down
and a young hurricane blowing at
shifting angles over the plain
Another evidence of Taylors Won
pionshp. In the first morning round
he played wonderful golf and scored
a "A. but one stroke back of Nardon
But in the afternoon his play fell bad
| Iy back-he was wild and erratic, and
was trapped time and again. The aver
age good golfer under these same con-
ditions would have been very lucky
to have gotten an So. But by the
genius of his recoveries. and ms Won
derful and tremendous determinations,
he actually finished with rs. but four
strokes worse than score gained by
almost flawless golf.
Taylor's mighty determination. once
he gets into a fighting mood. is sur
passed by no man in the game, put
when one is at times forced to keep
up this endless fighting he is at pig
disadvantage playing against one IKE
Vardon, who is working easily rms
accounts for Taylor's downfall in the
last round, when Vardon caught hlm
and passed on to additional glory
TAYLOR finally cracking under the
heavy strain of making brilliant re-
over seventy -two-hole route
would back Vardon against any golfer
that has ever lived. But II Vardon
and Braid should tie. and the contests
should be decided over an eighteen
hole battle. I would pick BRAID;
Braid isn't as steady as either tardon
or TAYLOR, but he is more spectacular
than either. When pressed or driven
| into corner I believe he can make
| shots that no other could ever nope 10
make. for he has not only wonderful
nerve. but a wonderful physique that
enables him to achieve the almost I'M
possible.
Made Big Advance.
Wheni Braid first swung into profess
sional competition unlike vardon and
Taylor. he showed little prospect of
championship form. He was poor
driver, a very short one from the tee.
and a poor putter But here the logged
determination and iron will of the man
entered. He took a putter, and for
weeks and months practiced for hours
at time until he had mastered this
weakness. trying out every possible
scheme. studying each effect. until he
had found the grip. stances and gen
eral position that felt most natural and
produced the best results.
Then he began to practice driving.
working working, week in and week
out until one morning, to his amaze
ment he found himself driving longer
ball than he had dreamed of. with forty
yards added overnight. He says now
that he hasn't any idea as to how this
added distance came, but it was hard
work that turned the trick.
OFF the tee Braid has a fuller swing
than Vardon, a mighty swipe, without
the body roll of Ted Ray. who is the
longest driver in the world.
But, after all, you may ask. what is
the one thing, the essential thing. the
different thing. that lifts these three
golfers. especially Vardon, so far above
the rest?
The answer is easy enough: there
are fifty golfers who have brilliance:
there are only three who have both
brilliance and steadiness. They are
travel at a fast clip. but nearly always
at the same clip. There are many
golfers who might beat Vardon in an
eighteen hole match. There is none
living that could beat him the major
ity of fifty matches.
At Brookline Ouimet tied with him
over seventy-two holes and beat him at
eighteen. But at Prestwich Vardon
finished first and Ouimet fifty-ffth. 1t
isn't what we can do one day-but
what we can do every day. In England
last season he played remarkable
| long series of matches-fully a hun
dred (including championship and
matches for big purses over champion
ship courses). His average score for
the entire summer was seventyfour-
or almost exactly par golf
II you follow vardoa. Braid and Tay-
| lor in a series of matches, you will
notice one thing: 1t isn't so much the
wonder shots of the game which make
them great as their strict adherence to
the simple but. essential things.
That is, you never catch one of them
| jerking his head up before hitting the
ball. Keep your eye on the BALI is
motto they follow to a finish. Some
times the rest of US do; sometimes we
don't.
Don't press Is another slogan of the
game. and a simple one. The one thing
| that will impress you about the game
| of these three is that they are always
| playing with lot in reserve. Appar-
entity they are never going the limit in
any shot.
! There are a lot of good golfers who
have perfect grips, perfect stances and
| swing in the correct way. But at times.
! under stress or strain, they can't help
| looking up too soon or swayiHg the
| body or committing some other fault.
But they take care of the main and
| simpler ingredients of the game-the