south africa
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2025
TOUR TECHNIQUE
WHAT PROS DO THAT YOU DON’T DRILLS TO MAKE BETTER CONTACT
THE NORWEGIAN TEES UP AT SUN CITY
ALDRICH POTGIETER’S JOURNEY
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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2025
4 GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2025
6 Editor’s Letter BY STUART MCLEAN Voices 8 The Undercover Pro WITH JOEL BEALL 10 Snake Bites! BY CHRISTOPHER POWERS 12 Journeys Aldrich Potgieter WITH KEELY LEVINS
46 Chili-Dip Chips BY JESSICA DICKSON
48 Swing Analysis Gary Woodland back to speed.
BY DAVE ALLEN Features
50 Viktor Hovland The new way to get good. BY MATTHEW RUDY 72 Be a Better Ball-Striker Swing smarter, not harder. BY RYAN HAGER
NEDBANK CHALLENGE
14 The Golfer’s Paradox BY JERRY TARDE
Teeing off on December 4-7, with a prize fund of $6 million, the Nedbank Challenge at Sun City is the third of five tournaments on the DP World Tour’s 2025-26 Opening Swing. The stands around the first tee are where crowds gather each morning.
16 Badge & The Boys Ryder Cup review. BY JAMIE KENNEDY 18 The Hole Truth RULES BY RON KASPRISKE 20 ‘The Best I Ever Did’: Architect Tom Doak BY JAIME DIAZ
80 The Core 13-minute body blast BY RON KASPRISKE 90 The 75 Coolest Records in Golf We rank the achievements least likely to be equalled. 100 End of The Range New wave of training facilities. BY SAM WEINMAN Where to Play 62 Gary Player CC Johannes Veerman defends Nedbank Challenge title, and Viktor Hovland is the star turn. 68 De Zalze Thrilling 13th will test the tour pros. 70 Steenberg Western Cape courses command the highest green fees. What to Play 108 Should you play easy-to-hit irons? The pros and cons of clubs designed to forgive your mis-hits (page 110). How to take some curve out of your tee shots by selecting the proper driver (page 112). Every item in Ben Griffin’s golf bag (page 114).
24 Happy Gilmore 2 BY MAX ADLER
26 Glory for SA Winning the Eisenhower. BY STUART MCLEAN 28 Worst holiday gifts To leave off your shopping list. 30 Legends Vision BY MICHAEL VLISMAS How to Play 32 Downhill Par 3s BY RYAN HAGER
34 Try a broomstick BY LUCAS GLOVER
36 Stop Sliding BY MARK BLACKBURN
38 Lob wedges BY BUTCH HARMON
40 Two-Minute Clinic BY CHRIS SPALLA
42 Key Bunker feel BY LUKE DONALD
44 Secret Formula to hit more Greens BY DAN CARRAHER
GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA 5
NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2025
EDITOR’S LETTER E AT 90, GARY IS STILL AN INFLUENCER
G ary Player is 90 and his life’s greatest achievement has been to remain relevant in global golf long after his playing career ended. He has followed in the broad footsteps of Gene Sarazen and Byron Nelson, two other legends who lived into their 90s. The Ameri- can media still listens to what Gary has to say about the modern game, and he maintains a sizeable influence as tournament host at the Nedbank Golf Challenge, in its 43rd edition this December. It wouldn’t surprise anyone if he is there for the 50th. Having a golf course named after you is unique, even among the game’s legends, and the Gary Player Country Club retains an iconic reverence among golfers in this country for that reason. Gary built and co-designed it, and Sun City developer Sol Kerzner paid tribute to one of our greatest sportsmen by naming the course after him. South Africans see the GPCC as our premier championship layout, and so does Gary. He wants those champion- ship credentials encased in stone for the future, and some of his proposed changes to make that happen are com- ing into play for the NGC from Decem- ber 4-7. New back tees will lengthen two holes, No 7 and 15, the fairway bunker on No 9 has been removed, and there have been aesthetic enhancements. These are only the first of a raft of changes to the course that Gary has proposed to Sun International, who have determinedly and resourcefully
kept the NGC going as one of the lead- ing tournaments outside the majors. I have heard Gary would like an extra 600 metres added to the overall length of the GPCC, thereby stretching it past Blair Atholl, another of his designs, and ultimately close to 8000 metres, making it the longest course on the planet. With so many young recre- ational golfers now hitting the ball out of sight with their drivers, who is to say that these won’t eventually become the club tees in the decades ahead. One of Player’s proposals is a new range left of the first hole, which would be a popular addition with Sun City resort guests. Watching what has been described as the rowdiest Ryder Cup match at Beth- page Black reminded me that American galleries have a history of abusing those they feel are a threat to their favourites. Their vitriol against Rory McIlroy in particular, and other members of the European team, is nothing new. Jack Nicklaus suffered unpleasant- ness from the legion of Arnie’s Army supporters when in the early 1960s he began displacing the much-adored Arnold Palmer as the game’s No 1. He was often booed. An unusually distract- ing Army tactic was total silence when Jack holed a birdie putt or stiffed a shot close. They would cheer if he bogeyed a hole, and fans put signs at bunkers saying Hit it Here, Jack. The strength of Nicklaus was that he was oblivious to all of it. He focused on winning. Gary too came under attack in the
late 1960s at PGA Tour stops. Not just verbal abuse but jostling from the pub- lic and stuff physically thrown at him. Much of it though was due to him be- ing seen as a supporter of apartheid. For a few years he played with a police security detail at events. Rory doesn’t receive that kind of unnerving treat- ment in the majors, where the crowds are today generally far better behaved than they used to be, other than the “shouters.” Finally, LIV Golf is moving to 72-hole tournaments in 2026, so the extra day will mean even more fans attending at Steyn City in March. LIV will hope that discarding the 54-hole format satis- fies the Official World Golf Ranking’s requirements to offer their players WR points. Stuart McLean stuartm@morecorp.co.za Titleist Performance Institute How to Avoid Blow-Ups Behind the Lens: Seve TaylorMade Qi35 3-wood Lower Body Workout America’s Greatest Hole CLICK ON THE LINKS BELOW TO VIEW OUR TOP SIX VIDEOS
GOLF DIGEST USA EDITOR-IN-CHIEF JERRY TARDE EDITORIAL DIRECTOR MAX ADLER EXECUTIVE EDITOR PETER MORRICE INTERNATIONAL EDITOR JU KUANG TAN
TEACHING PROFESSIONALS: TODD ANDERSON, MARK BLACKBURN, CHUCK COOK, HANK HANEY, BUTCH HARMON, ERIKA LARKIN, DAVID LEADBETTER, CAMERON MCCORMICK, JIM MCLEAN, MICHAEL NEFF, RENEE POWELL, RANDY SMITH, RICK SMITH, DAVE STOCKTON, JOSH ZANDER PROFESSIONAL ADVISORS: AMY ALCOTT, RANDY MYERS, NICK PRICE, JUDY RANKIN, LUCIUS RICCIO, BOB ROTELLA, BEN SHEAR, RALPH SIMPSON, DR ARA SUPPIAH PLAYING EDITORS: COLLIN MORIKAWA, JORDAN SPIETH
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THE UNDERCOVER PRO
Fighting with the Media These aren’t battles players should want to win
AFTER COLLIN MORIKAWA had a close call at Bay Hill earlier this season he didn’t stop for
questions. He got into hot water the next week when he tried to explain, “I don’t owe anyone anything” and then later doubled down with “I don’t regret anything I said.” I felt for Collin. I un- derstood what he was trying to convey, but he was fighting a battle that doesn’t need to be fought. As a PGA Tour play- er, I’ve learned that dealing with the media isn’t combat; it’s a dance. We didn’t face this attention and scrutiny in college like the football and basketball players did. Media cover- age on golf’s minor tours is practically non-existent. When suddenly we get to the PGA Tour, and microphones and recorders are being shoved in our face, it takes time to adjust and learn who we can trust. Often, we only learn who’s trustworthy after being burned. Five years ago, after a disappointing round, a writer asked what I thought about the course. I was honest but ca- sual: “Yeah, this isn’t my favourite. Feels like they had to overcompensate for some of the course’s shortcomings.” I even added a self-aware joke at the end: “Ask me tomorrow if I shoot 66,” acknowledging how we players tend to get whiny after bad rounds. Three hours later, I’m finishing dinner when my phone lights up with frantic texts from my agent. He’s sent a link to a story with a blaring headline claiming I had “ripped” the course. My nuanced comments had been reduced to click- bait, my self-deprecating humour com- pletely erased. That moment changed me. I became much more guarded, aware that anything I said could be
stripped of context and weaponised. Watch the video of Morikawa’s in- terview at The Play- ers, not just read the transcript. His
ply felt I had everything to lose and nothing to gain. Then my game cooled off, and the interview requests dried up. I’ve never admitted this publicly, but I actually started to miss the attention. Those media requests, I realised too late, were validation that I mattered in this sport. My declining performance was already bruising my ego, but be- ing dropped from the pre-tournament interview schedules delivered an extra helping of humble pie. Now I engage with the media more frequently and with genuine openness. I’ve learned to recognise the reporters who want to tell an authentic story versus those hunting for controversy. When I sense someone fishing for an inflammatory quote, I defuse it with deliberately bland responses. Even as my game rebounded and I’ve slipped back safely inside the top 50 of the world rankings, a new reality holds my pride in check. I’ll never forget walking into a media centre for my scheduled session right after Jordan Spieth had finished his. Jordan’s 15 minutes had drawn a standing-room- only crowd of reporters. When I took the same seat moments later, only four remained. That stark contrast led to a new goal: Make sure I play well enough next season so that every one of those seats is filled. – WITH JOEL BEALL
MIC DROP Removal from the interview schedule can signal a player’s irrelevance.
tone and facial expressions tell a com- pletely different story. His mistake wasn’t what he said; it was attempting to defend himself rather than simply falling on the sword. His perceived combativeness only amplified the situation, making him appear petulant and ungrateful, which reinforced all the worst stereotypes about professional golfers. I know Collin well. He’s nothing like how he came across in that moment. He’s incredibly generous with his time compared to most guys out here. Yes, he might have limited patience for uninformed questions, but engage him about something substantial, and he’ll talk golf with you for hours. The stretch of time that I wanted nothing to do with media obligations coincided, ironically, with some of the best golf I’ve ever played. This meant interview requests were constant. I fulfilled them, but my reluctance was evident in both my terse answers and closed-off body language. It wasn’t about disrespecting journalists – I sim-
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GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA 9
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GAME ON
Snake Bites! If you’re struggling with your putter, this game can be venomous BY CHRISTOPHER POWERS
WHILE THERE IS NO doubt that games like Wolf, Vegas and Skins get the com-
petitive juices flowing, for the hardest of hardcore gamblers (sickos?), sometimes it feels like there’s just not enough action. This is especially true if one player or team is dominating. Having nothing left to play for with a lot of holes to go can be boring. That’s when you need a good side bet, and since you do, might we suggest Snake? It can be fun and exciting – or very cruel if you’re the one stuck with the serpent at the end of the round. We’ll explain: REQUIRED: Four is ideal. BEST FOR: Great lag putters. Groups who like to hole out. Golfers who love the cliche, “drive for show, putt for dough.” Players who love side action. Anyone who likes to quietly watch other golfers squirm. HOW TO PLAY: Snake is simple. The goal is to not three-putt, or more impor- tantly, not be the last player to three- putt in the round. Start by deciding on a monetary amount that goes into the pot for each three-putt. Then, when someone in the group does, he or she holds the Snake until someone else in the group fails to get down in two or fewer strokes on the putting green. Then it’s passed on. The Snake gets longer and longer until cul- minating with the last person to three- putt. That’s who owns it, and he or she is then stuck paying the others whatever was in the pot. NUMBER OF PLAYERS You know that three-footer you nor- mally scoop up? You have to putt that one out, bud. Hit two balls OB and want
to say, “I’ll just take a six?” No, sir, you’re re-teeing. One thing to note is that just like in professional golf,
avoid having a lengthy first putt. Keep in mind, however, that your group should play the final few holes in the correct order (furthest from the cup goes first) to avoid arguments about who three- putted last. VARIATIONS: Progressive Snake has the pot doubling for each three-putt. You also can reward good putting. Per- haps one-putting from outside a certain length can revert the Snake back to its previous owner. No matter how you play it, this game will keep you focused. If you have a suggestion for a golf game, and you’d like to explain it, feel free to reach out to me on X @CPowers14 .
FEELING YIPPY? You might have to Venmo your group if you can’t roll the rock.
strokes from the fringe or anywhere else off the putting surface do not count as official putts. That means you should be thrilled if you just miss a green. Now you can chip or lag your next shot to set up an easy tap-in or two-putt. Fast forward to the few remaining holes, and you’ll start to see real strate- gy come into play with golfers who don’t own the Snake. It’s not unusual to see players purposefully missing greens to
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JO U RNEYS
Aldrich Potgieter: ‘I didn’t intend to become the longest hitter in golf’ WITH KEELY LEVINS
M Y PARENTS TOLD ME A LITTLE LIE when I was 8 years old. We were moving from South Africa to Australia to be less surrounded by crime and to pursue greater economic opportunity. A few families we knew had made the same move. I loved rugby – my dad had played profes- sionally before his career was cut short by injuries – but to protect me, he told me there was no rugby in Australia and that I had to focus on golf instead
got knocked out. Experiencing that pressure made me feel ready for Korn Ferry Q School. I won the second stage and earned eight starts. ● ● ● Although I won an event early, my game didn’t work well on Korn Ferry Tour setups. I was averaging 337 yards, more than a dozen yards longer than anyone on Korn Ferry or the PGA Tour, but on these short courses I couldn’t use my weapon. I missed a lot of cuts and slipped into a dark space. My dad reminded me to be patient and that I belonged. Driving, flying, eating at steak houses together – our conversa- tions always came back to golf. ● ● ● Over time, I got more comfortable being on the road and working with a caddie. I added a few top-10s to my win. By the end of the season, I’d earned my PGA Tour card for the 2025 season. I can use my length on the PGA Tour. My game needs to grow in other areas, but it’s good to be long out here. ● ● ● My breakout win, of course, was the Rocket Classic in Detroit last June. When that final putt dropped in the playoff, all my emotions came out. Even when you truly believe you can do it, it’s so crazy when it happens. All the media and everything that followed took three hours. By the time my dad and I left the club, nothing was open. Instead of going out to celebrate, we ate at Chipotle. ● ● ● The goal for my rookie year was keeping my PGA Tour card, and I did that. I already have the Masters and the PGA on my schedule for 2026, so I want to get into the other two. Each time I play a major, I get better.
My parents opened a cof- fee shop in Perth that also had South African grocer- ies. They sold bread, sweets and traditional meats like biltong. My favourite is vet- koek, which is deep-fried bread with meat filling. It’s like a bagel but better. ● ● ● I joined a golf club
yard while my parents’ shop struggled. We moved back to South Africa. ● ● ● In 2022, I finished tied for third in the African Ama- teur and got a spot on the SA national junior squad. When we went to the UK, it was my first time playing links golf. I missed the first
ALDRICH POTGIETER
PGA TOUR
AGE: 21
LIVES: MOSSEL BAY, SOUTH AFRICA
through my school. I got addicted to how tomorrow can always be better. At 12, I sensed my potential and started hanging around older teenagers and eventually learned how to beat them. Of course, I also learned that Austra- lians love rugby. I trained with my rug- by friends and with the wrestling team, but to avoid injury I didn’t compete in either. I’d decided my dream was to become a pro golfer. ● ● ● When I was 16, I grew three inches and started outdriving everyone. Chasing big distance had never been my intention. I think the body aware- ness I developed from other sports made the difference. I started compet- ing internationally. My school, King- sway Christian College, supported athletes and our travel in many ways. It took the pressure off my parents, so they could focus on the store. ● ● ● The pandemic was a horrible time in Australia. I hardly played any events. I made a crude hitting bay in our back-
two cuts of our tour. At the British Ama- teur Championship at Royal Lytham & St Annes, the wind was down enough that I could hit driver. I carried bunkers no one else could. I played some of the best golf of my life, and won. ● ● ● That win opened everything up to me. I was exempt into three majors. I had been looking at college golf but ditched that idea. My parents and I made the decision that I should turn pro after the 2023 US Open at Los Angeles Country Club. ● ● ● The 2022 Open at St Andrews was surreal. I played practice rounds with Louis Oosthuizen, Adam Scott and Ernie Els. Els challenged me to hit different shots, like running it low up to certain greens and long bunker shots. I’ll never forget when he said, “This kid’s ready.” ● ● ● Despite having just played in three majors, I didn’t have status anywhere. I went to Europe to play Q School and
PHOTOGRAPH BY BEN TURNER
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THE NEXT ONE’S GOOD
I AM QUITE CANDIDLY A dreadful golfer,” said Willie Geist, the TV Everyman who I invited to cover the 2011 Masters for Golf Digest. He was questioning whether he deserved the assignment. “I only really play at the public nine-hole on Shelter Island (New York), where the Caesar salad in the clubhouse gets more grooming than the fairways.” Golfers by nature are put-down artists. I was reminded of this when I was flip- ping channels and heard Willie effusing about golf now that he’s rediscovered the game playing with his 16-year-old son George. “I find it sometimes medi- tative, more often maddening, but re- ally, really hard,” he said, “and that’s what I like about it. You’re with your son or your buddy. It’s four hours. You’re outside in the sunlight, you’re hanging out, you’re actually talking. Nobody’s on their phone. So I’ve come to fall in love with it the last couple of years.” Wait, but that’s not the point. Willie’s conversation turned to his guest, the journalist Jim VandeHei, who’s asked if he plays golf. “Yeah, I do. I’m terrible,” he said. “I like golfing but I really do suck at it.” And there it is: the universal confes- sion of all golfers. We’re dreadful, we’re terrible. Despite loving the game, we suck at it. Why are golfers as a species so compelled always to proclaim our suckage? Earlier this year, Viktor Hovland said he “sucks” and in the next round shot 65 at Pebble Beach. “One day I’m great, the next day I suck – that’s golf,” said John Daly. DJ Steve Porter not surprisingly did a compilation rap with Charles Bar- kley titled, “I Suck at Golf.” Tim Schantz, who is the CEO of Troon Golf, said to me the other day: “I don’t understand it. I meet hundreds of people every year, and 99 percent of them say the same thing: ‘Oh, I play,’ they say, ‘but I suck at it.’” The Golfer’s Paradox We chase perfection but bond through failure BY JERRY TARDE
Fishermen don’t say, “Oh, I fish, but I never catch anything.” Neither do ski- ers or tennis players. You never hear, “I ski, but I’m lousy at it.” Or “I play tennis, but I stink.” Runners don’t say, “Yeah, I run, but I fall down a lot.” You don’t hear boaters or race-car drivers or amateur pilots admit it either. You’d probably sprint in the other direction if they did. So why do golfers revel in saying how bad they are? When you say you’re not very good, maybe you’re just acknowledging it be- fore someone sees for himself. You’re really saying, I hold myself to higher standards in other parts of life, but in golf I come up short. I asked the golf coach Jason Goldsmith, who works with Jus- tin Rose. “We’re already negotiating the bet,” he said. Social humility is an inside joke – we’re laughing at ourselves. Maybe it’s because golf is the most brutally honest sport there is. It lives in cold, hard numbers. Your failures are exposed naked on every shot, in every score, and there’s no hiding be- hind teammates. There’s all this time for observation and self-assessment. “I am what I am, and that’s self-deprecat-
ing,” said Michael Bloomberg, who has accomplished so much in life yet holds a 22.0 handi- cap index. Bill Gates is 20.9, and it’s there for the world to see. “Golf is deceptively simple and end- lessly complicated.” That quote, which used to be painted on our office wall in New York, is widely attributed to Arnold Palmer. The first time I saw it, I had to smile. I knew Arnold Palmer. I used to play golf with him, and there’s no way Arnold ever said that. Arnold didn’t use adverbs. He spoke in declarative sen- tences. I never heard him say, “I suck at golf,” but I could imagine him saying it. He knew the universal struggle that’s an essential part of the game’s identity. We play the only sport where the best in the world can look like the worst, and the worst in the world can hit a shot as good as the best. Arnie knew better than any- one: there’s solidarity through suffering. When you admit you suck, what you’re really saying is, “Hey, I’m part of the tribe. I’m a golfer.” THE KING’S MADNESS Palmer knew the frustration that haunts all golfers.
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RYDER CUP
The Badge & the Boys Europe’s Ryder Cup inspiration comes from within
Although hailing from different countries, the
European team’s commitment to one another sets them apart. BY JAMIE KENNEDY
It was an innocuous an- swer to a question about put- ting. Yet five words Justin Rose
said after the Ryder Cup have stuck with me for what they say about the 2025 European team. The 45-year-old Rose was brilliant on the greens at Bethpage, leading all 24 players in strokes gained/ putting, and my colleague Luke Kerr- Dineen asked him why. Rose shrugged and said he couldn’t explain it. “I wish I knew,” he said, with a celebra- tory beer resting next to his microphone. “I wish I could be a bit more selfish and know that 25 weeks of the year. But do you know what I feel like the power of this (pointing at his teammates), the power of the group, who knows what it is, that ability to lock in, the ability to just want it that little bit more.” Then he paused. “But the answer to your question is I don't know, other than the badge and the boys, honestly. That's all that mat- ters, honestly, the badge and the boys.” Rory McIlroy, draped in a European flag and sitting in front of Rose, nodded and said, away from his mic, “The badge and the boys, I like that.” Those five words from Rose echoed through the rest of a press conference that was full of laughs, some tears and players clinking their drinks. I thought back two years, to a Friday night in Rome when Rose rolled in a 10-foot putt on the final green to prevent the US from winning a single match on the first day of the 2023 Ryder Cup. You may remem- ber the putt. Do you remember the cel- ebration? Rose turned to his teammates, lining the edge of the green, and pointed at each of them.
ing to draw inspiration from the identity of their country. It may seem obvious, but I think it’s prescient to what I would later realise. The US team feels the need to represent their country while the Eu- ropean team seeks to draw inspiration only from those who have played before them. They don’t seem to be interested in playing for a country. They play for each other. They seem inwardly rather than outwardly motivated. As much as the Euros represent their continent, and wear their flag, they ultimately feel a responsibility to those who built Team Europe. I believe this plays out on the course. The US players came out on Friday morning, each carrying an American flag, to the sound of “Born in the USA” and “Coming to America.” They led chants of “U-S-A” and waved their flags. The patriotism was clear. But was it productive? When putts dropped for the Ameri- cans, players would look to the crowd and encourage them to cheer more.
“You, you, you!” he screamed, dedi- cating his half point to his 11 European teammates. He then beat his chest, slamming his right hand against the European team badge. His message that day was the same as it was in New York. The reason it reso- nated so strongly with me is because I saw it myself at Bethpage Black. It struck me for the first time on Monday when Keegan Bradley led his US team through the tunnel to the first tee, without their clubs, to soak up a moment together. They listened to the national anthem performed incredibly by New York City firefighter Bryan Robinson, and heard the moving words of Chris Mascali, a fire lieutenant who lost his father on 9/11. The only time you’ll hear the Europe- an anthem – “Ode To Joy”, before you ask – is at the opening ceremony. Ask the 12 players on Team Europe to name the anthem and I doubt the majority would know. After watching Bradley and his team on the first tee that morning, I realised that the Americans were seek-
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‘We are united by a culture and we are united by a generation of players that have come before us.’ – JUSTIN ROSE
They would walk off the greens in tow with their partners. When putts dropped for the Europeans, they turned to find their partner. There was pointing, there was hugging, there was laughing. They appear to have a bond that the US team is searching for. Every two years, everyone in golf at- tempts to quantify why the European team, underdogs on paper, seem to have success in this unique format of team golf. Rose, himself, was asked about it in Rome. “We are united by a culture and we are united by a generation of players that have come before us.” he told us on the back of a five-point European victo- ry. “This is our time. Luke has been very clear on that message, this is our time to shine, not because this is our stage, we are just taking care of it because of the amazing role models that we've had be- fore us that have shown us how to do it.” There’s no reference to Europe or a shared sense of responsibility to repre- sent a country or continent. “There's a really strong culture on the European Team. A good pairing on the European Team doesn't mean play- ing with your best mate. You know, it
about his team’s motivation, his answer got there. The badge. And the boys. In that order. Represent the team. Do your teammates proud. Don’t worry about anything else. That’s what is important. That’s how to be successful. And with 11 wins in the last 15 Ryder Cups, it’s working.
means representing something bigger than yourself, and I feel like that's, for me, what being a European Ryder Cup player is all about.” Fast forward two years and Rose again sat in a winning Ryder Cup press con- ference, the fifth time he’s done that, and whilst the question was directly
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RULES
The Hole Truth
Why you can’t get relief when your ball finds divot damage BY RON KASPRISKE
W hether you’re new to the game or have been playing it for years, you’ve probably experienced the deflating feeling of hitting a great drive that splits the fairway, only to find your ball sitting in a hole created by someone else’s shot. Although a divot hole is not impossible to play out of, it’s still a frus- trating situation. You did everything right, yet it feels like you’re being un- justly penalised. It’s at these moments when you might wonder why the Rules of Golf doesn’t al- low you to take free relief. After all, Rule 16.3 says you can remove an embedded ball anywhere in the general area of the course without penalty. Is this all that different? Let’s have Craig Winter, senior direc- tor of rules of golf and amateur status for the USGA, sum it up: “It’s fundamental to golf to play the ball as it lies,” he says, “and you don’t always get a good lie.” Although the USGA and R&A, golf ’s
rules makers, have con- sidered on various oc- casions handling divot holes in another man- ner, there is no “practi- cal solution” other than
a long time to heal, and they typically are not a focus of normal golf-course maintenance. For these reasons, don’t expect the “play it as it lies” fundamental to change anytime soon – if ever. Winter says new members of the rules committee want to discuss it from time to time, but it doesn’t go beyond that. “Philosophically, it’s hard to think of a different way we’d want to go,” he says. Also, remember that the next time you’re in one, things could be worse. Just ask Jordan Spieth about his Sun- day round at The Sentry tournament in 2024. He found his ball in a divot crater on three consecutive holes down the stretch! “The (divots) were certainly tough breaks because they were balls that hit in the fairway and funnelled into them,” Spieth said. “Out here, balls funnel into the same spots a lot. It’s not uncommon to be in divots. It kind of stunk that it was three holes in a row, but I still played (them) just fine.”
CRATERING Roll your
eyes, then accept your divot-hole fate.
to just leave it as part of the game, Win- ter says. If you think about it beyond the moment you’re in one, how often does it happen to you in any golf year? Probably not a lot. Furthermore, if the rule book treated divot holes as, say, ground under repair, think of how many spots on the fairway would then fall into that catego- ry. They’re all over the place, they take If divot holes were treated as ground under repair, think of how many spots on the course would have to be marked as such.
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75TH ANNIVERSARY
‘The Best I Ever Did’ For architect Tom Doak the pen was as mighty as the shovel BY JAIME DIAZ
PHOTOGRAPHS BY ANDREW JOWETT
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ney began. Because no one in golf histo- ry has ever managed their way through a comprehensive, immersive and above all self-designed training regimen aimed at becoming a golf course architect as precociously, persistently, pragmatically and successfully as Tom Doak. That, he affirms with a nod, is the best he ever did. Doak began playing golf at age nine at Sterling Farms, a municipal course in Stamford, Connecticut, that was close to his family home and allowed juniors to play after 3pm for one dollar. “With- out that I would probably not be in golf at all.” A couple of years later, Doak’s father, also Tom, began taking his son on his business conferences, introducing him to courses like Harbour Town, Pinehurst No 2, Pebble Beach and Cypress Point. The boy was so captured by the beauty and majesty that he felt a yearning to be- come a person who created such places. When a family friend gave him a copy of the 1976 classic The World Atlas of Golf, Doak, gifted with exceptional retention skills, read it often enough to know it by heart. After entering MIT as a maths wizard, he told his parents before the end of his freshman year that he want- ed to drop out and find a way to have a career designing golf courses. As Doak recalls, “They weren’t shocked.” With no Plan B, Doak, then 18, began a passionate pursuit. He unleashed a torrent of letters to prominent figures in the game, including Herbert Warren Wind, Deane Beman, Frank Hannigan, Pete Dye, and Ben Crenshaw, asking for advice. “I’d tell them about myself and ask, ‘If you were me, what would you be doing?’” All would eventually respond, but the first was Geoffrey Cornish, the designer, coincidentally, of Sterling Farms, who suggested Doak get into a college land- scape architecture programme. Cornell had such a curriculum, one which Rob- ert Trent Jones in the late 1920s had customised for himself on the way to eventually becoming the most prolific course architect ever. Once in Ithaca, Doak set about an- other letter writing campaign, this one focused on greens chairs of clubs with architecturally significant courses,
that some of America’s greatest courses, including Pine Valley, Pebble Beach, National Golf Links, Merion and Oak- mont, were done by architects on their first tries. “I was eager to get started and had a lot of ideas, but, really, my philosophy hasn’t changed much since,” says the now 64-year-old who retains a boyish energy. “I try to err on the side of doing too little instead of too much. If you can do a lot to the green, you don’t have to do so much to the rest of the hole be- sides follow what the land gives you. That 13th green fits into the land so well, it’s a true original.” That’s about the highest praise Doak can give, though for our purposes, still non-committal. “I was a totally free- spirit writing .... Some people still hold a grudge, but that was me being true to myself.” Doak’s most renowned courses are Pacific Dunes and Ballyneal in the US, while Barnbougle Dunes (with Mike Clayton), Cape Kidnappers and Tara Iti are each ranked 30th or better on Golf Digest’s World 100 Greatest. But Doak also mentions two public courses more geared to the average golfer – Common- Ground in Denver, with its under $50 green fee, and Memorial Park in Hous- ton, where his green complexes offered enough challenge to host the PGA Tour. “My goal has always been to do special things,” says Doak. “You work to get all you can out of the land that you’ve got, and the golf ideas keep evolving as you go along. At the end of the day, you should have something that is different and special.” Sensing a conundrum, he digresses, wondering whether authoring more books than any architect ever should be considered his best work, or if his mentorship of other current architects, including Gil Hanse, would qualify. In the end, Doak was drawn back to what most set him apart – how his jour-
Tom Doak sits in the clubhouse at High Pointe Golf Club, where he took on his first
solo project in 1987 at age 26. He vividly remembers that any doubts he har- boured disappeared after one shovelful of the rich soil. “Right then I just knew, ‘Oh, this is going to be good.’” Such confidence has been associated with Doak ever since. But now, on his home turf of Traverse City, Michigan, reflecting on four decades of excellence in golf architecture, he turns unchar- acteristically hesitant. It’s not easy for someone who has only given his all to decide on the best he ever did. Doak is generally unequivocal, espe- cially in print. In 1994, he released the book The Confidential Guide to Golf Courses shaking up the golf world with his unsparing “Doak Zero-to-10 Scale” applied to more than 800 courses he’d seen around the world. More than a few ostensibly revered ones received luke- warm 4s and worse. Doak has proven far more than a flamethrower. His reviews were marked by deep knowledge and sound reasoning. Several astute judgments – like giving the then scruffy and ignored but charming and breathtaking North Berwick an 8 – advanced the current era of minimalism. Doak considers golf architecture an art, and as he wrote in The Anatomy of a Golf Course one of his ten published books on the subject, “Every art needs good criticism if it is to flourish.” At High Pointe, Doak was reminded of the heathland at Sunningdale. Accord- ingly, the property’s bold and rugged lines are softened by an elegant classi- cal naturalism, along with a spacious- ness that provides “room to play,” in the words of his friend and fellow architect Ben Crenshaw. Doak built and shaped all the greens at High Pointe by himself, the only time he has done so in more than 50 completed and current projects. He began with the 13th hole, creating a rum- pled throw rug of perplexing slopes that are exhilarating to try to figure out, which a few architecture aficionados still con- sider the best green Doak ever built. Doak doesn’t to- WHEN I’M 64 Doak walking
his first solo project, High Pointe GC.
tally reject the idea. He has pointed out
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75TH ANNIVERSARY
mentor – Pete Dye. He’d sent several missives over three years asking the world’s most famous architect for a chance to work on his vaunted crew but had never got an answer. Then one day in the summer of 1981, Dye called Doak at his parents’ home and asked if he could get to Hilton Head, where he was building Long Cove, posthaste. “Everyone’s advice to me had been to go to work for Pete Dye, and after a few days watching him, I knew why,” Doak says. “He was out there at 6.30 every morning. Pete didn’t really work off drawings. He told me the only way he could get the results he wanted was to be out there in the dirt. I was there for nine weeks in the summer. People were wondering what an Ivy Leaguer was doing on this hot, sweaty construction site, but Pete took me seriously enough to talk to me about what it took to do the job. From him I learned that if you are going to design golf courses, it really helps to understand how they are built.” In 1982, Doak won a Cornell schol- arship to spend a full academic year studying golf course architecture in the British Isles. Doak caddied at St Andrews for three months and would visit 172 courses. After returning to the States, Doak worked for Dye for the next three years, helping build what would be for a time the world’s hardest course, PGA West in La Quinta, California. It was good expe- rience but not the direction an architect with such egalitarian golf sensibilities wanted to continue. Shortly after, Doak struck out on his own, founding Renais- sance Golf Design and in 1987 landing High Pointe. It would mean meeting the challenge of running a business. Says Doak: “Peo- ple I’ve now known for more than 40 years have said to me, ‘On one hand, the way your personality was, it was hard to know if you could succeed at business on your own, but on the other hand, you knew so much about your business when you were 20 that it was hard to see how you could not be successful.’” The difference maker was how it all began.
asking for permission to visit and study their designs. “Sometimes, like at Pine Valley and Augusta, it would take three or four letters to get a response,” Doak says, “but I was relentless. Most of the clubs could tell that I was on a serious mission and wanted to help me out. Mostly, they would tell me I was the first one who had ever writ- ten to them.” After getting the green light, Doak would set off in his misbegot- ten Mustang II and head to Crystal Downs, Prairie Dunes, Olympic Club, et al. By the time he was 20, he had walked or played virtually all the best private courses in the country. Doak’s facility with the written word and typewriter had been nur- tured by his mother, Betty, a former editor of academic periodicals. When he was in third grade, Doak couldn’t get started on a school assign- ment when his mother offered him three cents a word, but only on the condition that she would be allowed to shorten what he’d written to make it better. “She taught me to get to the point,” he says. Doak would also come to learn that his writing ability was a coping mechanism. While he felt loved and supported by his parents, even considered a “miracle baby” because his mother was 42 when she gave birth, Doak was brought up in a household in which emotions were largely hidden. He was conditioned to show his affection by excelling at school, in the process becoming a driven and often distant perfectionist. As an adult, the pressure of expectations for his proj- ects exacerbated his issues and caused difficulties at work and at home. About a dozen years ago, at his wife’s suggestion, Doak attended Adult Chil- dren of Alcoholics group therapy ses- sions and gained some life-altering insights. “Both my mother and father grew up with alcoholic parents, and they also drank,” says Doak, whose parents have passed away. “It’s not that I grew up afraid of my parents. It’s that my parents grew up afraid of their par- ents. Their reserved personalities and discomfort with anything emotional had an effect on me. Some of the things
that people have observed in me – like being awkward dealing with people one on one, overreacting to disagreements – it was from that,” Doak says with steady eye contact, noticeably different from our first meeting back in 2001. “Yeah,” he responds, “I’m better around people now.” From adolescence, Doak expressed his inner feelings through writing. “When someone bothered me in some way, I’d write something and give it to them. It freed me up to say what I felt.” In a similar way, he could unburden himself of strongly felt opinions about the game. Confidential Guide and some of his articles had a controversial edge that made Doak unpopular among some peers. “I’m a totally free spirit writing,” Doak says. “Some people still hold a grudge, but that was me being true to myself in a world where every course was either good, better or best.” It was undeterred letter writing that finally reeled in Doak’s most important By the time he was 20, [Doak] had walked or played virtually all the best private courses in the country.
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MOVIE REVIEW
C ONSIDER THIS MY PUBLIC retraction for privately telling everyone “Happy Gilmore 2” would join the pantheon of unwatchable sequels and possibly go down as one of the worst movies ever made. I was on set, circumstantially, for an hour of its filming, and the predic- tion was extrapolated from watching one scene go through a dozen takes that felt like a hundred. It was the part where a surgically enhanced punk rock “golf- er” from the rival league lunges to twist Rory McIlroy’s nipples in a pre-match stare down, and Bryson DeChambeau steps in to exhort, “Don’t twist my boy’s titties; those are my titties!” To my defence, the final cut revealed zero additional understory or relation- ship (romantic?) between these charac- ters to make that line funny beyond the repetition of a naughty word. As I exited past the tractor trailers teeming with gear, people and catering, I appreciated better how $150 million is lit on fire. Thirty years removed from his break- out heroics, Happy Gilmore (Adam Sandler) has become a middle-aged amalgam of John Daly (long-hitting, fan-favourite, blue collar, financial struggles tied to addiction) and Tiger Woods (long-hitting, fan-favourite, dominant winner, drastic swings to his public image tied to addiction). The for- mer revels in the winks, playing himself from the seat of an overstuffed recliner with enough lines to qualify for a sup- porting role. Unsurprisingly, the latter is the con- spicuous absence amid scores of cameos that include everyone from Collin Mori- kawa to Rickie Fowler to Jack Nicklaus to Travis Kelce. With a general audience in mind, credit to the writers for choos- ing the game’s two most widely familiar lives over which to write their jokes. In Gilmore’s comeback , he joins Shooter McGavin (insanity’s descent I Was Wrong About “Happy Gilmore 2” BY MAX ADLER
fiercely played by Christopher McDon- ald) and a team of golf stars to battle a rebel league that’s a naked mix between LIV Golf and professional wrestling. With real-life defectors such as De- Chambeau, Brooks Koepka and Bubba Watson cast as traditionalists, the jokes smartly play to the fat of the green. An- tipathy towards the upstarts is directed less at the concept and more towards a clueless tech-bro commissioner with bad breath who bears zero resemblance to Greg Norman, Yasir Al-Rumayyan or Scott O’Neil. While convention inevi- tably wins, the PGA Tour is mocked by a rousing rally of solidarity among its players at a dinner that never happened. Getting image-conscious top-10 play- ers to actively participate in their own rebuke is walking a comedic tightrope. Bravo. Sprinkled amid a lot of slapstick is subtle golf gold, too, like the casually ob- noxious pro Billy Jenkins (Haley Joel Os- ment) whispering the swing tip “Xanax arms” to himself, or the cheerful but haggard former-player-turned-reporter Gary Potter (Kevin Nealon) earnestly asking Scottie Scheffler, “If you’re the best, does that make everyone else the worst?” In one line, our too often grasp- ing 24/7 media world is sympathetically skewered. The real reason “Happy Gilmore 2” is a success lies, of course, with Sandler’s
ability to delight as a man-child. Secretly, don’t we all wish we could respond to life’s complexities by throwing lawyers through glass doors?
TRAGIC HERO Happy Gilmore’s character is a mix of John Daly and Tiger Woods.
The capstone of Gilmore’s plot-initiating financial ruin is a lawsuit from beating up the repossessor of his car (“I didn’t know I had to renew the lease”). Lov- ingly, Gilmore tells his four grown sons at dinner, hockey players all, “We fight in the basement, not at the table.” I rolled the dice on the PG-13 rating and watched “Happy Gilmore 2” with my son who is 7. Bo was gripped un- til the credits and insisted we rewind the montage where Gilmore’s recovery shots ricochet into his head and “wein- er” (Bo’s word). When two of his friends were over one day shortly after, the boys took turns in the backyard with a wiffle ball bat between their legs pantomim- ing the phallic thrust demonstrated by Gilmore’s sons with the tools of their various wage-earning jobs. Later, aware that I played golf, his friends asked me to teach them. I almost shed a tear. None had seen the original “Happy Gilmore.” That’s why the sequel is a smash (not to mention opening to $40 million at the box office). For a new generation, the game exists . I’ll bear any number of weak nipple jokes for that.
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WORLD AMATEUR CHAMPIONSHIPS
Glory for SA in elusive team triumph
Only the fourth country to achieve hat-trick of world titles.
South Africa’s victory in the 2025 Eisenhower Trophy in Singapore comes as a huge
surprise after decades of disappointing failures by our men at the World Ama- teur Team Championships. It completes a wonderful triumvirate of trophies in international team strokeplay golf. We have become only the fourth country to win the World Cup, Eisenhower Trophy, and Espirito Santo Trophy, following the United States, Australia and Sweden. To win the Eisenhower Trophy in the modern era you usually need a tremen- dous individual performance from one team member, and that was supplied by exciting prodigy Christiaan Maas with his 22-under-par (266) subjugation of the Tampines course at Tanah Merah Country Club. The individual runner- up, from Australia, was 10 shots further back, and the margin between SA and silver medallists Australia in the team event was eight shots. Our winning team total was 29-under 547. The 22-year-old Maas, who had a T-4 in the SA Open at Durban Country Club earlier this year, winning the Fred- die Tait Cup as leading amateur to add to his SA Amateur victory in 2021, was representing SA in his third consecu- tive Eisenhower. However, his younger team-mates Charl Barnard, the reigning SA Amateur champion from Centurion Country Club, and Daniel Bennett were both rookies, and played their parts well. With two team scores to count in each of the four rounds, they had to ensure re- liable back-up to Maas under the pres- sure of leading from the second round onwards. Bennett, a 20-year-old college
Hutchinson is the only surviving mem- ber of the four-man SA team which tied for sixth place. Golf was far from being a global sport then. When South Africa host- ed the World Champs in 2006 in Stellen- bosch, there were 77 competing nations. Those championships, played at De Za- lze and Stellenbosch Golf Club, saw South Africa win the women’s Espirito Santo Trophy for the first time with the teenage trio of Stacy Bregman, Kelli Shean (Rack- ley) and Ashleigh Simon (Buhai). That was as close a finish as you can get. Kelli holed a putt on the final green to tie with Sweden, and our girls won on a countout of scores, as there was to be no playoff.
team-mate of Maas at Texas University, was T-8 in the individual on 7-under 281. His third round 67, coupled with a 65 from Maas, basically clinched the out- come that day, as it stretched the team’s lead to 11 shots. Bennett first shot to fame in the 2023 SA Junior champion- ship, when he shot 34-under at Pecan- wood to win by 21 shots! Interestingly, the Tampines course at Tanah Merah was redesigned by South African Phil Jacobs in 2017. The first Eisenhower Trophy in 1958 was played on The Old Course at St An- drews, and South Africa was among the original 29 participating nations. Denis
“This has been the goal for such a long time, not just to compete, but to truly be in contention for the Eisenhower. All the experiences I’ve had through GolfRSA and the opportunities to play world-class amateur events and college golf in the US prepared me for moments like this. To stay composed under pressure, to manage my game, to trust the process – that’s what got me through this week. But it’s not just about me. Dan, Charl, and I played for each other and for South Af- rica. To be part of the team that finally got it done is something I’ll never forget. When you think of all the incredible South Africans who’ve represented our country at this event, it’s humbling to be part of the team that finally took that last step. We stayed calm, trusted our process, and played for something bigger than ourselves.” – Christiaan Maas
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