A brief History of Golf
A brief History of Golf
A lot of contoversy exists about how it all started. Roman emperors apparently played a relaxing game called paganica, using a bent stick to drive a soft, feather-stuffed ball. Over the next 5 centuries the game developed on several continents and eventually evolved into the popular Scottish game known as golfe. Various European countries had games resembling paganica-- cambuca in England, jeu de mail in France, and in the Netherlands het kolven, which was played in the American colonies as early as 1657. The Scottish game, however, is the direct ancestor of the modern game. The first formal golf club, the Company of Gentlemen Golfers, now the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers, was established in Edinburgh in 1744. It codified the first set of rules, which helped eliminate local variations in play. The Royal and Ancient Golf Club, established 10 years later at St. Andrews, Scotland, became the official ruling organization of the sport. Its rules committee, along with the United States Golf Association, still governs the sport. Among the major men's tournaments are the Masters, the U.S. Open, the British Open, and the PGA. Women golfers have their own tour, sponsored by the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA), the governing body for about 600 women professionals. Their four major tournaments are in the LPGA, the U.S. Women's Open, the duMaurier Classic in Canada, and the Nabisco Dinah Shore tournament. Golf is played, to some extent, in most countries of the world. In Japan, for instance, golf is sometimes regarded as the national pastime. The Ryder Cup, begun in 1927, is a biennial men's professional competition that used to be between a U.S. team and one representing England, Scotland, and Ireland. In 1979 the latter team was expanded to include members from all of Europe. The Walker Cup and Curtis Cup are amateur competitions for men and women respectively, between teams from the United States and England, Scotland, and Ireland. The former began in 1922 and since 1947 has taken place in odd-numbered years. Curtis Cup competition began in 1932 and is held in even-numbered years.
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Some basic rules
Some basic rules
The basic golf rules are internationally uniform for both men and women. A player is permitted to carry a selection of up to 14 clubs of varying shapes, sizes, and lengths. The U.S. golf ball is a minimum of 1.68 in. (4.26 cm) in diameter; the British ball was slightly smaller, but is now the same size. The game changed considerably in the early 20th century when the B. F. Goodrich Company of Akron, Ohio, invented a lighter, tightly wound, rubber-threaded ball, which replaced the gutta-percha ball used in the 19th century. A golf course generally has 18 holes spread over a landscaped area that customarily includes a number of hazards--water, rough, sand traps (also known as bunkers), trees--that are designed to make the game more difficult. Difficulty is also increased by the varying distances among holes. Play on each hole is begun at the tee area, from which players "tee off" or "drive" the ball into the fairway. At the end of the hole--which can vary in length from about 150 to 600 yards (135 to 550 m)--is the putting green, which surrounds the actual hole, or "cup," into which the ball must be putted in order to complete the hole. Saint Andrews in Scotland, Augusta National in Georgia (site of the annual Masters tournament), and Pebble Beach in California have some of the most famous and difficult courses. Golf is usually played by groups of two to four people who move throughout the course together, each participant taking a turn to play his or her ball. The ball must be played as it lies, except in unusual circumstances when the rules allow for the ball to be moved to a slightly better position. In stroke competition the total number of strokes used to move the ball from the tee to the hole is recorded as the player's score for that individual hole. The player who uses the fewest strokes to complete the course is the winner. In match play scores are compared after every hole, and a player wins, loses, or halves (ties) each hole. As the game has developed, the courses have become more difficult to play, and the most successful players are those who are able to drive the ball more than 200 yd (183 m) from the tee, approaching most holes with fewer than three shots. Each course has established an average number of shots (par) necessary to reach a hole (usually depending on length), and thus an average number of shots needed to complete the course. Most championship-caliber professionals score in the mid-60s to low 70s, depending on the tournament and course. Golfers use a peculiar and distinct language to describe their scoring--a birdie is a score on any one hole that is one stroke less than par, and an eagle is a score on a hole that is two less than par. A hole in one,is scored when the player drives the ball into the hole with only one stroke.
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