Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1926-07-15

close on his heels at Scioto.
The first two days-Thursday and,
FTiday--prohabIy were the most try
ing days the Southern youngster has,
had in any OF the open title tits in
which he has played. The first day
Of the championship he got around in
TO- But what 10. Struggling
against bad breaks, hitting his shots
without the snap and physical CO.
hesion that marked the Jones OF the
final nine of the championship, Bobby
looked anything but national cham
pion. yet so great is he at short
distances from the hole that he con-
vested what would have been q 70 or
80 for an average player into q 20
to keep within striking distance OF
Bill Mehlhorn.
And the next round the bolt that
had been forecast by his ragged
round of the day before struck full
on the Jones head. Bobby had his
worst round in the history of open
championships--a ragged 70 which In
cluded three penalty shots, one OF
them called by himself when II IL
doubtful IL any but the coming cham
pion actually saw the ball move as
he addressed it on the fifteenth green.
Gale Handicapped Jones.
The 70 was made In the day Of the
big wind--a 40-mile gale that reister-
ed up and down the hay-fringed fair
ways of Scioto- carrying high tee
shots far into the towering rough
and sending pitch shots scattering
across adamant green's. At the short
ninth his pitch shot struck specta-
tor and fell into q bad lie in q bunker,
where he lost a shot getting out, and
the hole cost him 8.
At the tenth, with the gale, sweep
ing across the fairway, his bail ended
on top of a stone wall within the
banks of a water hazard. From
there he played a 170-yard masffe
shot across an elm tree to the green
and nearly hoied a. 4.
And then came that fifteenth,
where the wind whistled across the
putting green and. his ball rolled over
ae he laid the pulitzer behind It.
Coming to the eighteenth Jones, even
though playing poorly, had for
q 76-quite good enough, for the
best score OF the day was ~. And
facing the roistering wind. he pushed
a tee shot into the rough, hit his
next 80 yards still in the rough, pulled
across the fairway into the rough on Z
the other side. finally got home in
and took three plitte for CHASTITY z.
At the end of the first round Bob
remarked to a friend. Why can't
play this cock-eyed gamer" And at
the end of the second round he was
resigned to bad golf.
Was Prepared to Eight.
Yet that night at his hotel the
flghting spirit of the Jones who
wouldTf't give UP fiared forth. For
Jones, who had left the course with.
out learning the scores of some Of the
others, looked down the list and found
there were but five men ahead Of
him and that Mehlhorn led by only SIX
shots. Bob Jones never bragss but
he quietly remarked. 1T doesn't look
impossible, and have had my two
bad rounds"
The senior Jones, a lighting athlete
in his younger days at college, knew
that Bob had not gone too far behind
the hill to look over into the pleasant
vale of victory, for he told Bob that
.l4l win VIM Two 72s. 1t didn't
look impossible, and 1t wasn't, for
that is just what Bob Jones did He
scored IA, with II on his third
round and a Is on the last round.
His first, third and fourth rounds
were fully up to the Jones scoring
standard. vet on all three of them he
pIayed only one fiawless nine holes
the last nine of the championship.
The Others were all struggles, valiant
efforts to keep a mounting score
down within reasonable limits. The
second round was just CHASTITY mess
the worst effort of the Jones cham
pionship career. We maintain that
II Jones had hit his stride on Friday.
the second day of the championship,
he would have opened 50 big a gap
after the third round no one would
have pressed him at the end.
Shout Upset Turnesa.
Another failure that might be
charged to overzealous committee
men may have been the reason Joe
Turnesa lost the championship. The
debonair New Yorker was breezing
along nicely on his last round to the
twelfth hole, where some ardent
galleryite stepped out of the closely
knit ranks that fringed the fairway
Just as Joe started his back swing.
Al gallery official, catching the spot
Of white moving far down the fair
way, and apparently failing to see
that Turnesa had already started to
hit the ball, yelled Hey, keep still.
And Turfiesa, distracted by the. shout,
topped his ball. He took q s to the
with regularity, and 5s when he
missed putt.
That shot may have cost him the
championship. Yet every title chase
has one or more incidents OF this kind
And only Bobby Jones keeps scoring
along the even path, though he also
has felt the sting Of disaster caused
by some distracting incident.
HageTss real crash came on the $500