Tranlate this title New ball: yes or no? Golf’s existential question in spanish

When a handful of well-to-do Scots decided to organize themselves into the St. Andrews Golfers’ Society in 1754, the seed of what would eventually become the Royal & Ancient Golf Club, golf was a rustic sport, played with wooden clubs and leather balls, on courses with minimal human intervention, a David versus Goliath battle against nature. Today, the tables have turned. Nature can no longer hold back the advance of humankind.

In these two hundred and some years, it has gone from a pastime for aristocrats and the bourgeoisie to a mammoth industry, employing hundreds of thousands of people, serving more than 100 million players—professionals and amateurs alike—across five continents, and generating enormous sums of money. It is a niche activity, but with a global reach. Now, shafts are made of steel and graphite; clubs, of stainless steel, carbon fiber, or titanium composites; The balls are made with polymers and synthetic rubber.

Everything is measured, using terminology that sounds like it came straight from a NASA manual: angle of attack, maximum height, dispersion range, point of impact, time in the air… A professional knows the wind speed and direction at any given time of day, the probability of rain, and the amount and speed of rain on the greens. And if they don’t know, they can ask Chat GPT. DeChambeau, who has made his career almost a scientific approach to golf, even uses it to correct his swing.

The problem? These are turbulent times for the governing bodies of a sport that, until now, has managed to walk a fine line between respecting tradition and rejecting progress. The R&A and the USGA have panicked. Especially the former, because it sees that links courses designed with the 19th-century golfer in mind are becoming obsolete in the face of the 21st-century golfer, the biotype established by Tiger Woods: more Koepkas and less Dalys. They can’t stand seeing St. Andrews, the jewel in the crown, devoured by men capable of hitting balls well over 300 meters or parking a camper van converted into a mobile gym in the course’s parking lot, like Justin Rose.

So they finally came up with a solution: a new ball model with a limited flight range. The possibility of limiting its implementation to the professional sphere was considered, but ultimately, it was decided to make it universal to avoid a historic split. It would be the first time that one of golf’s seemingly indissoluble principles, part of its magic, would be broken: the fact that any amateur can play with the exact same equipment as their idols. The measure was announced in late 2023, with a timeline that would lead to its widespread use on the tours by 2028. The plan fell apart this Wednesday, the day before the start of the 126th U.S. Open, when the R&A and USGA announced in a statement, along with the PGA Tour and DP World Tour, that it will not take effect until at least 2030. “We will take the appropriate time to evaluate all options and determine the path forward,” they stated.

This is partly the result of the criticism the project has accumulated over the years. The initial resistance has obviously come from manufacturers, who would be the most affected, having to market a new product while simultaneously seeing a decrease in demand for an established one. In the end, they will do as they are told, because it is a very lucrative market. The average golfer spends much more than, say, a soccer or basketball player. Studies put the figure at over $2,000 annually. If a regulatory consensus is reached, their position is mandatory. No ball, no party.

The American and European tours had also failed to align themselves until now. The PGA Tour even announced at one point that it would not adopt the new model, raising the possibility that it would only be used in the majors. There, the opposition has come from the PGA of America, promoter of the PGA Championship. Furthermore, the USGA controls the US Open, the R&A the British Open, and Fred Ridley, president of Augusta National, home of the Masters, passionately defended the need to address this issue in his press conference prior to the last edition.