Bob Charles: “Shorten the tees, shorten the golf courses and shorten the performance of the ball’’

What a fabulous rant this is by Bob Charles on the absurd situation that is regulators having ignored doing their job.

Stuff’s Tony Smith talked to Charles about his biography and pointed thoughts in it on what a mess things have become.

As always I suggest hitting the link to enjoy it all, including his views on the new approach to U.S. Open golf. However, the 70-time winner and former Open champion’s view on the time rounds take and the women’s game was especially good:

The answer, Charles believes, would be to limit the power of the golf ball. He noted tennis and cricket balls had not “changed over the years’’, although cricket bat improvements had allowed the ball to be hit further.

“It’s a combination, in golf, of technology in clubs and balls, which are not doing anything for the good of the game.

“What people must know is that technology helps the fitter, stronger golfer much more so than it helps someone with a slow swing speed, the club golfer who only hits it 200 yards or less.’’

Charles, who still enjoys watching golf’s Majors on television “and events on courses I know and enjoy’’, is concerned that longer courses are leading to longer rounds, which could, potentially, put people off golf.

“When I first went to St Andrews, the course measured 6500 yards. Every tee was beside the green. The playing time for the members was between three to three-and-a-half hours. That was how I grew up – a round of golf took three to three-and-a-half hours.

“Now it’s taking four to four and a half hours. Watching those ladies play [in a LPGA event], they take five and a half hours. Now, what’s that doing for the game?”

I know! Nothing.