Shorten the balls, save the game: PGA boss

Shorten the balls, save the game: PGA boss

Reuters, Munich, Germany

European PGA president Jaime Patino has called on the major
golf tours to agree a standard specification ball to prevent
traditional golf courses obsolete.

Patino, the multi-millionaire Bolivian owner of Valderrama,
the Spanish venue for the 1997 Ryder Cup, made his plea to an
audience of golf professionals and officials at a trade
exhibition in Munich.

Patino spoke during a debate entitled "Lengthen the course or
shorten the ball".

"Problems are on the way. We are in danger of spoiling the
game," he said.

"There has to be a limit imposed or else it will become a
drive and a wedge game.

"Golf will become boring, just as tennis has become boring and
people will be driven away from the game."

Patino said many traditional courses would become obsolete
because many of the hazards would no longer come into play.

He said that, at least for major championships, the governing
bodies of the major tours should agree that players use a
standard specification ball which flies through the air maybe 18
meters less than the recent innovations.

"The players of the major tours have the future of the game in
their hands," he said.

"They must protect the integrity of the traditional golf
courses.

"There are fewer people watching golf and it is becoming a
worry. There have to be some controls."

However, Frank Thomas, former U.S. Golf Association technical
director and the man who invented the graphite shaft, said it
would be dangerous to have one rule for professionals or majors
and another for the amateur player.

Tennis has faced a similar debate in recent years as racket
technology has given today's players enormous power.

Last month the International Tennis Federation agreed to the
introduction of bigger, slower balls in an attempt to prevent the
game becoming completely dominated by the serve.