"It's when his cleats touch the greens that Na pulls the parachute on his pace of play."
/Gene Wojciechowski investigates this slow play business by following the second group out at Bay Hill consisting of Kevin Na, Chad Campbell and Paul Goydos and files a wildly entertaining column. Even with only one group in front of them they took nearly 5 hours to play and fell a hole behind the group in front of them.
I spent a numbing 4 hours and 46 minutes following the threesome of Na, Chad Campbell and Paul Goydos during the first round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational. They teed off at 7:52 a.m. and completed their round at 12:38 p.m. At 12:39 I chugged battery acid.
Only one threesome teed off before them -- not that we ever saw it. Na & Co. never had to wait to hit a shot, were never slowed by any official rulings and had only one instance when a player (Goydos) dunked a shot in the water and had to drop. And it still took nearly FIVE HOURS!
Here's an interesting suggestion from Kenny Perry...
"I would put all the slow players last out in the morning and last out in the afternoon on Thursdays and Fridays," said Kenny Perry, who shot 79 and WD'd after the first round. "Now that way -- and I'd put them all together, I'd pair them all together -- they're in the back, they're not going to hold anybody up and they're all going to be together ... Then they're going to get behind and they're going to get on the clock and they're going to have to speed their game up."
A, B, C and S (for slow!) pairings? I love it!