Competitive spirit at it's finest.

Yesterday was the final round of the Ladies Club Championship. 12 year old girl is 1 behind after 1 round, 1 shot behind after 2 rounds, leading by 1 shot after 14 holes of round 3. This 12 year old girl has been playing tournament golf since she was 7 years old, and has competed in a number of international junior tournaments, a number of State junior tournaments in America, as well as every monthly medal for the past couple of years at the club. She is pretty much a picture purfect junior golfer who knows the rules, knows the etiquette, and understands completely the spirit of the game.
After this young girl takes the lead on the 14th hole, her playing partners start to verbally abuse her, scream at her and bully her into tears, hystarical tears. Her crime, taking practice strokes with the putter, not practice putts, practice stroke, off to the side, out of sight, but apparently not out of mind of her playing partners. Like what I do and I'm pretty sure you also do, on every single green of every single hole of every single game we play. She can bairly keep it together to finish the round with the bullies who don't let up but manages to finish, still in hystarical tears, and can only think about running off of the 18th green into the safety of her mom and dad's arms. Loses the tournament by 1 stroke and vows to quit golf before ever returning to the club.

Young girl, I hope you learned your lesson!

Champion, congratulations on a noble victory! Be proud.

Sad for the little girl, I hope she doesnt quit and come back strong. For the other bully, you will get to learn your lesson one day........

newbie question...what is the diff between practise strokes and praticse putts?

part and parcel of the game, golf is not just a physical game playing in solitude

She should have reported to the committee. Maybe she is not aware of her rights.

She will grow up and be better. She will mature and do well. She will become more experienced and be able to handle such stress.

And she'll realize that no matter what happens, she's still much younger than those aunties around her

Duval_S wrote:

newbie question...what is the diff between practise strokes and praticse putts?

From a newbie understanding...practice strokes mean actually practice putting on the green with your ball, as opposed to practice strokes, where you are just taking "air" putts without the ball on the green.

Is this correct?

I also understand that we can't take practice strokes in stroke-play competition, right?

Maybe Punkrockpga can help to clarify.

here is the other view ..... thrash talking is very much part of the modern game.

at least for me....thrash talking is way better than stepping on my putting line (disclaimer: in the event I can putt....very rare days)

The practice stroke I am talking about is simply standing out of the way while the others putt, taking little putter swings to keep your stroke loose and maintain a sense of feel. No ball, no distraction, no nothing.

I am sorry to say that trash talking is not part of the game and is acceptable absolutely never ever. Not in golf. This was a situation where an adult realized that she was going to loose to a 12 year old and took actions that go against every single thing that competition in golf are all about. Etiquette, respect and sportsmanship. Even if the young girl did do something that was against the common practices of etiquette, there is right way and a wrong way to handle the situation. Bullying and scaring a 12 year old, trash talking. Pretty sure you won't find those things in the etiquette section of the rule book from the R&A.

punkrockpga wrote:

The practice stroke I am talking about is simply standing out of the way while the others putt, taking little putter swings to keep your stroke loose and maintain a sense of feel. No ball, no distraction, no nothing.

I am sorry to say that trash talking is not part of the game and is acceptable absolutely never ever. Not in golf. This was a situation where an adult realized that she was going to loose to a 12 year old and took actions that go against every single thing that competition in golf are all about. Etiquette, respect and sportsmanship. Even if the young girl did do something that was against the common practices of etiquette, there is right way and a wrong way to handle the situation. Bullying and scaring a 12 year old, trash talking. Pretty sure you won't find those things in the etiquette section of the rule book from the R&A.

I thought it was a flight of youngs girls? eg, the image in my mind was 3 early-teen girls vs 1 12-year-old.

yes it is ugly behavior.
yes the adult did all she could to win
in a perfect world, she should be whipped for bullying a young kid
in our world, she is rewarded for being a bitch.

but you know what, the 12 year old girl has learnt a very real and important lesson that she would have to learn eventually.

Hopefully she takes it the right way and becomes tougher, that way her mental game will match her physical game.

i have heard how those ladies champion operate. i just hope the teenager do not learn and use those dirty tactics to win in the future.

DGman

This is not right if justice cannot be served, at least should name and shame the adult. Whatever she did against the girl goes against the spirit of the game we all love.

Which club are we talking about here? Jcc? Not many clubs in sg...