Olympic Golf Needs PGA’s Ringing Endorsement

Golf may have the world’s most popular athlete and a loyal international audience, but it does not have a gold medal tournament in the Olympics, and probably won’t for quite some time.

The subject of making golf an Olympic sport crops up seemingly every time an Olympic torch lights up. This year is no different.

A group known as the World Amateur Golf Council has approved a plan to pitch another proposal for Olympic golf.

The group is headed by David Fay, United States Golf Assn. executive director, and Peter Dawson, secretary of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club, and has the support of nearly every major golf organization in the world.

But the PGA Tour, the organization with the most recognizable golfers, has been conspicuously silent on the matter, and some fear that if PGA Tour players don’t participate, the International Olympic Committee will not approve the sport.

“I think the IOC looks favorably upon golf,” said Marty Parkes, senior director of communications for the USGA. “But in recent years they have been trying to attract the best athletes in the world from every sport and I’m sure they would like to see as many of the top golfers as possible. It would help a lot to get a contingency of all the major organizations.”

Translation: We need the PGA Tour.

It isn’t that the tour is against the idea, it’s just not fronting the march.

“There hasn’t really been any great cry for Olympic golf by the PGA Tour members,” tour spokesman Bob Combs said. “It’s certainly an interesting concept and we are not against participating, we are just not actively involved in anything to do with the Olympics right now.”

The tour has several concerns. First off, how would players wedge the Games into an already packed schedule that includes several major international events, including the British Open and PGA Championship during the summer? Second, where would Olympic gold fit on a list that includes green jackets, claret jugs and Ryder Cups?

“I don’t think it would be a big priority in our game, just because we have four major championships with equal significance every single year,” Tiger Woods, the No. 1 golfer in the world, said in a recent Associated Press interview. “Now, if we had majors that were once every four years, you throw the Olympics in there, it would have quite a bit of significance.”

The fear is that golf will go the way of tennis.

“While . . . [Andre] Agassi may have won and the Williams sisters may win, I don’t think that [Olympic tennis] gets close to our appreciation of tennis at the pinnacle--meaning the Grand Slam events,” said Terry Jastrow, an award-winning sports television producer. “I suspect that the experience in golf would be similar.”

Another concern is coverage. Golf fans have grown accustomed to watching the sport a certain way, and it isn’t the 10-minute chunks that most Olympic events get. Even if golf became a prime-time sport, it’s unlikely to pull Olympic fans away from popular events such as gymnastics, swimming and track.

Red tape is also a problem. It has taken more than 10 years for the World Amateur Golf Council to get this far.

First, it had to be recognized by the IOC as the governing body of international golf. That happened in 1990. Next, the council had to approve the idea of proposing Olympic golf. That happened last month.

Now, the WAGC must work out the details. Who is eligible to play? What will be the format? Who will pick the team? Will it be a demonstration sport at first?

“There are a number of concerns that need to be worked out for us to get on board,” Combs said. “Right now, it certainly is not imminent.”

Golf was an Olympic event in 1900 and 1904. The reasons for its discontinuation are unclear. Rules were prepared for the 1908 Games in London, but an apparent breakdown in communication led to cancellation of the event, according to USGA records.

Later, golf simply did not conform to Olympic criteria. In order to be considered, a sport must be widely practiced in at least 75 countries on four continents by men and in 40 countries on three continents by women.

When those criteria were finally met in the late 1980s, the IOC refused to listen because there was no international governing body for golf.

In 1989, the WAGC was approved as the governing body and proposed golf as a demonstration sport for the 1996 Atlanta Games. The IOC was leaning toward approval until learning the proposed site, Augusta National Golf Club, has a history of excluding women and minorities.

And now, with wholehearted support from some golf organizations and lukewarm support from others, the process is again underway.

Just don’t expect to see it reach fruition soon. “It would be almost impossible to have it before 2008,” Parkes said.

SOLHEIM SISTERS

The LPGA Tour moves to Portland, Ore., this week for the Safeway LPGA Golf Championship and at least eight players are gunning for more than the trophy and winner’s check.

Nancy Scranton, Becky Iverson, Cristie Kerr, Kelli Kuehne, Beth Daniel, Betsy King, Tina Barrett and Brandie Burton are Nos. 9-16, respectively, in the U.S. Solheim Cup team points standings and are separated by only 24.45 points.

The top 10 players after this week’s tournament get automatic berths and captain Pat Bradley will select two players to complete the team that will play against a European team Oct. 6-8 at Loch Lomond Golf Club in Scotland.

A victory this week is worth 30 points, second is worth 15 points and third is worth 13.5 points. Fourth through 10th are worth 12, 10.5, 9, 7.5, 6, 4.5 and 3 points.

Juli Inkster, Meg Mallon, Rosie Jones, Dottie Pepper, Sherri Steinhauer, Pat Hurst, Kelly Robbins and Michele Redman have secured eight of the 12 spots on the team.

The European team, announced last month, is Laura Davies, Trish Johnson and Alison Nicholas of England; Annika Sorenstam, Helen Alfredsson, Liselotte Neumann, Catrin Nilsmark Sophie Gustafson and Carin Koch of Sweden; Janice Moodie of Scotland; Patricia Meunier Lebouc of France and Raquel Carriedo of Spain.

The United States won the 1998 Solheim Cup, 16-12, at Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio, and holds a 4-1 edge in the biennial competition.

NEW HOME NEEDED

The Southern California Golf Assn. and the City of Industry are scrambling to find a home for the Ralph W. Miller Golf Library after the abrupt closing of the esteemed facility last month.

Formerly housed at the Industry Hills Sheraton resort, the library was considered second only to the USGA museum in New Jersey among significant golf libraries in the nation. A new management company at the resort wanted to use the space for conference rooms and offices and gave less than two weeks’ notice that the library would close.

The valuable collection, owned by the City of Industry, includes a 22-page book from 1743 thought to be the first book devoted entirely to golf, and another thought to be the first to mention the sport.

It also contains much of the history of golf in Southern California.

“We are very concerned with what will happen to it and we hope to facilitate finding a place that will embrace it,” said Bob Thomas, director of communications for the SCGA and an avid golf historian.

The City of Industry has ensured the SCGA that the collection will remain intact until a decision is made on what to do with it.

HAPPY TRAILS

Ocean Trails Golf Club in Rancho Palos Verdes is set to open as a 15-hole course within the next month, course professional J.R. Bottoms said.

The Pete Dye-designed course made national news last year when, just before opening, much of the seaside 18th hole collapsed into the Pacific.

“We don’t have an exact date, but it will likely be the beginning of October,” Bottoms said.

The course has also received full clearance to rebuild the 18th. That project is slated to begin early next month and be completed in early summer 2001. The ninth and 12th holes are being used as staging areas for the construction.

Green fees for 15 holes are $145 on weekdays and $195 on weekends.

JOINING THE FIELD

Sergio Garcia and Davis Love III have committed to play in the Tiger Woods Foundation’s Williams World Challenge Nov. 27-Dec. 3 at Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks.

They will be part of a 12-player field, including Woods and defending champion Tom Lehman, playing for a $3.5-million purse. The winner of the 72-hole, stroke-play event wins $1 million.