 How does women's professional golf score over the men's game in entertainment value? Give us your opinions for the chance to win tickets to the Ladies English Open at The Oxfordshire in July. Indeed is there a case, like Wimbledon's tennis participants, for the girls to receive equal prize money to the men? Whether you can attend or not it's still a chance to give us your views on the women's game and how they can attract even more support.
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| Edited: 10/06/08 09:30 |
 Glamour Girls ? Poulter playing then ? 
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 Apart from ogling Brittany Linsicombe's lovely frame, I can see no point in watching Ladies tour golf, any half decent male county amateur could beat the lot of them. Sure they can play, and they can play very well indeed, but its girlie golf, short courses, longer Par 4's played as Par 5's, watered receptive greens with easy pin positions, firmed up fairways for extra roll, the ruff cut back. Everything is done to allow them to score low and make it appear that they are better than they are. Its why we see so many tiny Korean ladies do so well, the tour courses play so short that they can compete with their little 200 yard drives. Put the lot of them on Torrey Pines this week and see what they score, most will struggle to break 90. I am FOR Ladies golf on an equal standing basis, but Ladies tour golf is boring, contrived and not championship quality golf.
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 The unfortunate fact of life is that Ladies golf will never be on an equal standing with men's golf - that goes for amateur to professional. This is due to many issues, including that the sport has already made it different with separate score cards/tee boxes and rules (handicaps in the amateur game). Women’s professional golf continues to grow in stature and I for one applaud that, as I believe there should be harmony between male and female tours. However, sponsors and sport stars alike are degrading that with the Michelle Wie debacle and the nudity of some of the European Female Tour Stars. As Creosote alludes to, the ladies play a different game to the men and I am in agreement with this. If the sponsorship providing the finances, continue to see the lack of return on their investment ladies prize money will forever remain different within the professional game. That said, we can learn a great deal from watching the professional ladies play and I would welcome the opportunity of seeing the stars of any tour play.
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 I love watching Ladies Pro golf, There seems to be much more course management involved. As the Majority of them have similar driving distances to myself! Its not all Driver 300yds then 9 iron/Pw to green and there are some real lookers in the field too makes a change from watching Monty, Furyk and Co Ugling up the course!
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 I personally applaud Ladies golf but agree that the Mens and the Ladies should be a level playing field. Several years ago Italy were allowed into the 5/6 Nations rugby tornament, they spent time as the whipping boys. Professional/National/Personal pride made them improve in leaps and bounds to a point now where they challenge the rest of the nations in the tornament. To my mind Ladies Pro Golf is similar (no I do not mean full of 6'2" hairy neandethols) in as much that the game is in its early stages. The Michelle Wie debacle will only spur on some women to drive themselves to a point that they can truely compete with the men. I believe that in 10 years or so we will have women competing in male dominated tournaments and challenging the leaders. I will be honest seeing a waif like figure drill a ball 250 yards down a fairway is a great sight and only goes to show how much of golf is technique rather than size and strength.
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 I very much enjoy watching the ladies golf. I can relate to the distances they hit the ball and imagine that i play similar irons into the greens. I do not subscribe to the opinions of those who say that the courses are set up short etc etc - anyone who can shoot scores in the 60's regularly as most of the ladies do HAS to be a very good golfer no matter what length the course is. As i live fairly close to The Oxfordshire i am going to watch this event anyway and believe that it will be entertaining and i am looking forward to comparing the skills on show against those that i saw at Wentworth whilst watching the PGA.
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The ladies tennis is as popular to watch as the mens, which makes it right that the prize money should be the same. The problem with ladies golf is that it doesn't attract the same amount of people watching, whether live or on TV, so sponsors won't be putting as much money in. To watch I agree womens pro golf is more relevant to my game in terms of distances hit and length of holes.
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Ladies will never compete with men, either at the amateur or professional game as long as they play shortened courses. It encourages and rewards short hitting. It's not all about hitting it long but ladies bunting it 200yds and making millions of bucks doing so just generates more of the same type of golfers. To succeed in the men's game at any level you have to take the risks of hitting the ball long, you cant just settle back, tap it 200yds down the middle and be competitive. The ladies game removes risk and rewards safety. Until that doctrine changes ladies will never be able to compete with men at golf.
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 Took my wife and daughters to the Ladies British Open at Sunningdale a couple of years back. To watch the ladies in the "flesh" (no dodgy quoting here please ) was a real eye opener. Obviously they can't spank the ball the distances the men do, but watching them it's so easy to relate to your own game with distances hit and such. However watching Laura Davies was amazing...she just hit's the ball so long from any lie. You also didn't have the big ego's or aura of self importance many of the men exude and thus the whole event felt much more relaxed and enjoyable.
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Ladies will never compete with men, either at the amateur or professional game as long as they play shortened courses. It encourages and rewards short hitting. It's not all about hitting it long but ladies bunting it 200yds and making millions of bucks doing so just generates more of the same type of golfers. To succeed in the men's game at any level you have to take the risks of hitting the ball long, you cant just settle back, tap it 200yds down the middle and be competitive. The ladies game removes risk and rewards safety. Until that doctrine changes ladies will never be able to compete with men at golf. The important point you make there Creo is "middle"....which is where most of the women I saw put the ball. OK they don't knock the provbial 300 yds, but they were mainly straight as a die and putting the ball where they wanted it. Perhaps if the mens game didn't have the abundance of spotters, and spectators to bounce the ball off or tread the rough down they might also decide to rein in the distances hit in favour or accuracy.
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 I love watching the LPGA, the good lady golfers probably play on Par with my game. I'm no big hitter and neither are most of the girls, so I can relate their shots with mine. Also when you look at some of their swings, its so smooooth, not like some of the guys where they hit the ball hell for leather. Oh, I'll not mention they look so much better than the guys, especially the two Aussies. Leave the girls alone, they are getting paid for doing something they enjoy, wish I did!
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Sort of agree with Creo, although I would be surprised if there are many lady pros capable of making a living who only hit it 200 yards. I think there is a lot of humbug talked about lady's golf in general and lady's sport in particular. If they "deserved" to be paid the same as the men, then they would be, the market would see to that.
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 I enjoyed watching the girls when it was on the Golf Channel (RIP 2007) but apart from Lorena, Annika & Laura there are not many true golfers. Look how well Lorena played at St Andrews and hammered the rest of the field into submission. Sure they can hit it straight after being lined up by their caddy for 10 minutes beforehand but their game seems to be safety first whereas the men will take on the risks and give it a go and that separates the champions from the rest of the field. Whilst I am all for a level playing field I believe that it is comparing apples with pears.
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 I enjoy watching the ladies play because obviously it comes a bit closer to something I can aspire to, in comparison to the men's tour. (I am already well on the way to matching the Laura Davis figure  ). It's easier to follow the mechanics of the swing when watching the ladies, and I also pick up relevant course management tips. I like the fact that the majority of the ladies look as though they ENJOY the game (in comparison to some of their male counterparts). Commercially, I think that women should only receive the same prize money if their game were ever to be on a par with the men. (No pun intended)
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 I enjoy watching the ladies play because obviously it comes a bit closer to something I can aspire to, in comparison to the men's tour Mary, me too!
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The men HAVE to take the risks to be able to compete, the length and severity of the courses dictates that, conversely the ladies CAN play safe as the short length and lack of severity of the courses permit it. The tour golfers dont choose the courses, the sponsors do and the sponsors wanna see ultra low scores so they set the courses up short, hard fairways, receptive greens and no ruff. I dont have or make an issue with the players themselves, they are out doing what is required to be succesful, and what is required in the ladies game is to be able to bunt the ball down the middle, taking the risks out of the game. It makes a mockery of tour standard golf and elncourages short hitting safety first players, and that is why its a bore. There is no element of excitement, the "will they go for it or not" cos they dont have to. I just wish they played on proper courses that challenged them and encouraged the next generation of lady pro golfers to play the game more as it was intended, rather than a bunt it round, take no risks, bloomin great yawn.
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 Sod the golf it would be worth going just to see Sophie Sandolo close up, and hope she's shooting her new calendar on the practice range!!! Corrrrrrrrrrrrr Mind you knowing my luck it'll be Laura Davies 's calendar the day I go!!!!!
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| Edited: 11/06/08 02:01 |
Can Laura still crack walnuts in the cheeks of her arse, I wonder .....??
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 I watch the ladies competitions because like it or not boyo's most of 'em knock it the same distance as we do and therefore have similar length approach shots etc., they're just 100 times more accurate when they do it. A 420-450yd par 4 is a real test to the ladies (Laura excepted o'course) and they usually have to go in with a long iron or a fairway metal, so watching their course management would be of great benefit to the average gentleman golfer. O'course most idiots delude themselves that because Sergio, Tiger, Justin et. al. can reduce a short 450yd par four to just an iron and a wedge then that's the same for all blokes, isn't it?? 
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