Tiger On Target

Tiger Woods met with some of the games great scribblers on Tuesday to kick off the Target World Challenge week. Beforehand, he bombed drives out of the Sherwood Country Club range despite a headwind. More impressively, he then hit slice and draw wedges on the range for a handful of lucky folks, including his mom who had endure some annoying instructor telling her his life story. She's a saint. 

Anyway, I've never seen anyone draw or slice a wedge. These were not gently falling cuts or slight right-to-lefters helped by the wind. Draws and slices to a target 80 yards away. Amazing stuff.

The relaxed press conference took place in the claustrophobic Sherwood cart barn, where yours truly was on hand to take in the proceedings. The highlights:

Q. When did you know you wanted to open the learning center? How old were you and why is it so important to you?

TIGER WOODS: I really wanted to do it once I got out here. I wanted to have something tangible that kids could touch, kids could feel, they could be inside of. I thought what we were doing by going around the country and trying to inspire youth was great. We're just starting. We're in infancy stages. But I didn't think we were doing enough. We were kind of a circus, coming in for one week and we're gone. What about the other 51 weeks?

I wanted to do something that was going to be there permanently, something we could call home as a foundation for kids to come in, for kids to learn and grow, and I wanted them to create their own programs. The entire curriculum is based on their wants, their desires and their needs.

Now, some of us have been a bit skeptical about the learning center because of its cost ($25 million). Listening to Tiger talk about it in person and hearing his passion for the project, it is clear he has genuine pride in the Learning Center and how it has a chance to impact young people.

So yes, I feel like a jerk.

Later, a few questions were asked about the bomb-it-out-there-and-worry-about-the-consequences-later approach to golf, better known as flogging.

TIGER WOODS: It's how the game has changed. It's evolved. In essence, it's evolved in the fact that we're able to hit the ball greater distances. But again, the long hitters are still able to carry bunkers that the average guy can't carry. And that's how it used to be anyway.

I think technology now has spread out the guys a little bit more with the added physical strength of guys, too, guys getting to the gym and really working on becoming stronger and more flexible, are able to get a lot more speed. Add to that technology, in the shaft and heads. And more importantly, be able to marry up the shaft, the head, and the ball, because that was never the case. We all had persimmon drivers and let's just go play and hopefully we can get it out there.

After a few more questions about turning 30...

Q. There was a story in Golf World last week about performance enhancing drugs and steroids in golf and the possibility of it. Do you think there is a possibility that players are using anything and should there be perhaps a Tour policy or testing on that, either steroids or any kind of enhancing drug?

TIGER WOODS: There's always a possibility. Unless you're tested, there's always going to be a shadow of doubt on any sport. I don't see anyone out there who I would think would have finds of it, but who's to say there aren't. We don't know. We don't see any guys out there, 6 5, 240, 250, in shape, cut up, all ripped up. We don't have guys out there like that.

Q. Are you in favor of testing or do you think that's something that should be treated with a little more study?

TIGER WOODS: I think we should study it a little bit more before we get into something like that. Obviously it's a path that where do you draw the line? Do you do it on the PGA Tour nationwide but don't do it on any other tours leading up to that, or all professional golf.

Obviously there is a lot to it than just, okay, there's mandatory testing. Where does it start? Who does it? Who is in control of it? What are the substances that you're looking for. In the Olympics you can't take aspirin. A lot of guys live on aspirin out here.

Natural Evolution of A Healthy Sport?

In the January/February 2003 Virginia Golfer, USGA Executive Director David Fay said: 

I believe a burning issue facing the game is whether the talent gap between the best players in the world and the rest of us is widening to the point where we need to consider a more restrictive set of equipment rules for the most highly skilled players. A number of very thoughtful people who have golf's best interests at heart have widely divergent views on this topic. The game is attracting more outstanding athletes who are better trained and more fit and they are benefiting from advances in golf equipment technology and golf course maintenance. And these athletes are also much more committed to spending seemingly endless hours fine-tuning, practicing and improving their games. As a result, today's golf courses are playing shorter for the best players than ever before. Whether this is a "problem" or a natural evolution of a healthy sport depends on your point of view - and quite often, your age. 

That final comment went over wonderfully with folks who were tickled to have Fay write their views off to nostalgia. He used a similar "age" argument during this May's Sports Illustrated roundtable. 

Now, in Matthew Rudy's excellent Golf World story on steroids, various experts state that performance enhancing drugs are used in golf or will become an issue for the sport. Especially as long as there is no testing and power is rewarded.

In the Rudy story, Fay refused to comment on the subject. Maybe that was a wise move, since the same story reveals PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem demonstrating a Donald Fehr-like interest in steroids (and we know how well Fehr's approach went over).

Earlier this year, Fay touted the USGA's compliance with the International Olympic Committee's policies on boys-becoming-girls as part of his and Peter Dawson's International Golf Federation quest to get golf recognized as an Olympic sport. Yet, as part of the unsuccessful Olympic effort, there was no publicly-stated interest in having the U.S. or British Open become IOC-compliant on steroid testing.

"Gender reassignment" was a higher priority.

The thought of a golfer taking strength-enhancing drugs was once unfathomable, and yet we are now learning that various steroids or performance enhancing drugs may help players get an edge.

So why the lack of action by the governing bodies or Tours?

Perhaps because no change in golf has been more important in rewarding and understanding the role of clubhead speed than optimization of launch conditions. This fitting process allows ball-driver combinations to pass the USGA testing under the launch conditions stipulated in the rules, while allowing players to go undetected even as they exceed the Overall Distance Standard under their own launch conditions.

Strength is going to be vital to the golfer of the future that wants to get the most out of today's equipment and who hopes to further optimize launch conditions under the USGA/R&A radar. Matched with the right ball-driver combination along with added strength from performance enhancing drugs, a player could pick up significant tee-shot distance without breaking any rules.

Yet courses are getting longer and narrower in response to dramatic changes in the way golf is played thanks to this lax (well, negligent) deregulation.

Is this really the natural evolution of a healthy sport?

Golf and Steroids

Matthew Rudy pens an excellent and downright stunning Golf World feature analyzing the possibility of steroids in golf. Stunning, in part because of the certainty experts have that players are using steroids, but mostly it's a jaw-dropper because of the ho-hum, naive and downright bizarre responses from certain governing body.

It's easy to peg the explosive distance gains in professional golf to a familiar set of theories: supercharged modern equipment, improved agronomy and sophisticated workouts by dedicated athletes. No one in the preservation-of-the-game versus unfettered-technology debate disputes these factors. But could golfers also be getting an assist from something else?

Yes, and why is the door open to steroid usage? Could lax rules on modern equipment fitting offer ususually juicy benefits for those with certain clubhead speeds? Could fault equipment regulation have shifted the playing focus from players developing a balanced game to a power-focused style?

After six months of research, Golf World has not turned up a documented case of steroid abuse on golf's major tours.

Research reportedly entailed photo analysis of LPGAers once known for their peach-fuzzed lips suddenly requiring shaving, and a thorough search of PGA Tour lockers for Clearasil and bras (or Manzeers?). John Daly and Phil Mickelson's lockers were skipped for obvious reasons.

Sorry, just trying to keep it light.

Still, the rampant use of steroids in other sports and the insistence of medical experts that steroids can enhance performance lead some to believe steroids will inevitably encroach upon pro golf, probably first among young amateurs and developmental pros. Those concerned about the matter suggested that golf's governing bodies address such a possibility by enacting more clear rules and drug testing now.

"I haven't heard any talk about steroids in golf, but no sport is immune to it," says Dr. Gary Wadler, a clinical associate professor of medicine at NYU and a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency. "Any component of strength is going to be enhanced by taking them. If a golfer can benefit from added strength, steroids are going to be a benefit in that regard."

Naturally, statements like that mean golf will need at least a 3-year study to disprove an expert like Wadler. 

The average driving distance on the men's tour has increased almost 30 yards since 1980, but that gain has been attributed mostly to equipment advances, not chemistry.

Get Rudy some talking points!  They're working out more, Matthew. Oh, and there's lots more roll than the old days when before three-row irrigation systems.

Run the numbers, though, and it's easy to see why a chemical "helper" might be enticing for a player who has hit the wall in terms of adding distance conventionally, through a combination of exercise and finely tuned equipment. On a launch monitor, each additional mile per hour of clubhead speed is worth roughly two yards of carry. If the average male tour player swinging 118 miles per hour with the driver added 10 percent more speed, he could carry the ball nearly 25 more yards. For an LPGA player swinging at 95 mph, that means a gain of almost 20 yards.

Here's where it starts to get scary, or sad, or just plain pathetic:

"If I had 5 percent more clubhead speed, I'd still be playing 30 tournaments," says [Nick] Price, who averaged 282.6 yards in 2005. "Let's face it. Unless you can hit the ball 310 yards now, you will never be No. 1 in the world, and that's a sad state of affairs. If I'm playing with a college kid and he's hitting it 280, I tell him he has to find more. But what if he's maxed out his power? The message we're sending him leaves the door open for him to try something else to find the power he needs."

And why is this message being sent? Ah yes, right, so that grown men can continue their equipment shopping addiction unfettered by silly rules.

In golf, the risk of detection is almost zero. No professional tour -- or the USGA -- has specific language in its rules prohibiting performance-enhancing substances. 

But surely the USGA, which this year made a big fuss about updating its gender reassignment policy to keep up with the International Olympic Committee, is on top of this to remain IOC-consistent, right?

USGA executive director David Fay says he not only has no comment about the USGA's position on steroids, but he won't comment on whether the subject has even come up in the organization's policy meetings.

That's our David. Inconsistent as ever.  

PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem says the tour's conduct rules -- and the tradition of players policing themselves when it comes to those rules -- have been a sufficient deterrent to this point, but the tour would not hesitate to incorporate a random drug-testing program if it had evidence of a pattern of use by players. "I don't think it is naive to think our players follow the rules," says Finchem.

I do! Self-policing on steroids? What are guys supposed to do, stick a cup in front of a player when he's at the urinal?

"Maybe there are doctors who would say that steroids would help a player hit a golf ball farther. We could debate that, and we could debate that the side effects might hurt a player other ways. I don't go there. We have a rule, and we expect players to follow it.

Uh, no, you don't have a rule or testing.

"If we have credible evidence to think that a player was taking them, we would consider taking other measures. Players have been fined and suspended for other conduct that was unbecoming a professional, and we wouldn't hesitate to do that in this case."

Oh, so conduct unbecoming a professional. But there's no testing, so what are they unbecoming of if you can't prove they're unbecoming?

You know, you wouldn't be in this mess if they hadn't scrapped the optimization...ah, forget it.