Golf: Happy 50th Sir Bob

This story, written by the Herald's Sir TERRY MCLEAN and published on November 8, 1954, details Sir Bob Charles' historic win at Heretaunga

Youth Beats the Field In Golf Open

18-Year-Old R. J. Charles Equals Record of 280


From Our Golf Correspondent

WELLINGTON

By a wonderful performance, surely one of the most stirring and remarkable in the history of the championship, the 18-year-old Masterton bank clerk, R. J. Charles, a left-hander, on Saturday won the New Zealand Open golf title at Heretaunga.

His score of 280 for the four rounds not only equalled the championship record set in 1950 by the present British Open champion, P. W. Thomson, of Melbourne, but it had the even more arresting effect of causing the defeat of Thomson, who, with Bobby Locke, of South Africa, ranks for the time being as the foremost professional golfer resident outside the United States.

Thomson, in fact, could do no better than third, for he was supplanted as the leading professional by his fellow Australian the 19-year-old Bruce Crampton, of Sydney. Crampton had an aggregate of 282 and Thompson of 284.

Then followed the New Zealand amateur champion, D. L. Woon, of Hamilton, on 286, and four more players, F. X. Buckler, the unattached Auckland professional, W. G. Horne, the Wellington amateur, E. A. Sutherden, the Napier professional, and A. E. Guy, the Titirangi professional were all on 288.

Perhaps there has never been a day in championship history quite like this. Certainly one cannot remember either so partisan or so large a crowd as when Charles, with the almost unnaturally calm determination which is his greatest characteristic, holed his final putt of five feet.

The gallery of nearly 3000 let out a shout as violent as if it had just seen the All Blacks score the winning try against the Springboks. Several men rushed on to the green to chair Charles. He had to save himself from falling off the heaving shoulders by throwing his putter to his partner, and for a fraction of a time the elation he must have felt was expressed in his flinging of the winning ball to the crowd.

Just previously women had jumped and screamed with joy when his second shot to the 17th green finished only a couple of yards from the hole. And when the putt that might have given him the eagle slid by the hole, a loud "Oh" positively dropped out of the crowd. All this behaviour, so alien to golf in New Zealand, caused a couple of important reactions.

Charles himself kept his feet firmly on the ground. He confessed that he had felt some nervousness, but only at the first hole of the third round in the morning, when the sight of a largish gallery, the biggest he had ever experienced, gave him a twinge of doubt about his ability to retain their interest. However, he began this round 3, 3, 4, 4, 3, and no one could ask for much better than that.

At a late stage of the fourth round he took 5 at each of the 11th, 12th and 13th holes, but even these errors at so vital a stage did not, so he said, upset him.

Thomson's reaction was highly complimentary. "This is a great thing for New Zealand golf," he said. "I am very pleased."

The essence of the championship was the fight of the fourth round among Charles, Crampton and Thomson. Many extraordinary deeds were performed during the day. Southerden, for instance, won the Jellicoe Cup for the lowest single round of the championship with a dazzling 66, thus equalling the record set in Hastings in 1949 by G. E. Revell, of Manukau. Southerden and a Manawatu amateur, D. G. Leng-Ward, both scored the first nine holes in 32, three under the scratch figures, and Southerden in his morning round had an inward half of 33, also three under scratch.

Horne had two rounds of 70, a fine performance, and Woon retrieved some unprofitable scratching about in the morning with a glittering 68 in the afternoon. It was good to see, too, young players like J. D. Durry, of Otago, I. Dyer, of Manukau, and N. F. Dowden of Akarana, putting up good scores, even if this did reflect the sad change in the game of the former champion, A. Murray, who had an 80.

By lunchtime and the end of the third round, young Charles had grabbed a lead of five strokes with a wonderful round of 68, marred only by a slackly hit second to the 11th hole and a 6 at the 13th from a drive into gum trees, and a certain amount of ill-judgement in the recovery.

He was then on 209, with Crampton - also a 68 man with a wonderful 3 on the 10th - on 215, and Thomson, pursing his lips concernedly in manufacturing a 73, on 216.

They went out in the order, Charles, Crampton, Thomson in the afternoon, and, in finishing that way, they proved again the truth of the adage of medal play golf that he strikes shrewdest who strikes first.

There is another adage that the inexperienced must always blow up, and when Charles missed a yard putt on the first hole of the last round and took a 5 it was difficult to restrain the knowing look.

Half an hour later or so a wild rumour fled through the gallery following Crampton - "Charles has blown up."

At this precise moment Charles was comfortably getting his 4 at the sixth hole, and up to this stage his figures were 5, 4, 3, 4, 3 (obtained by a fine chip from a difficult position).