Non Stop Games, It’s A Battle of Fitness Rather Than Skills.

It was a battle of fitness and concentration.

Nasty spring rain has become the most decisive factor for winning the green jacket of the 67th U.S Masters.

The weather had been raining off and on for four days before Thursday (local time)

which was the day of opening round. Then the rainfall of 120mm of a heavy rain began to fall on Thursday, and for the first time since 1939, the opening round was postponed by rain. So players had to play the first and second round in one day.

Such a bad weather is not a big hurdle for young players such as Tiger Woods (U.S.) who is aiming to win the 3rd straight green jacket and Kyoung-Ju Choi(Suerior, Taylor Made) but it is a serious problem for old players. The temperature even dropped to around 10 Celsius causing more burdens to the old players.

“On the wet fairway, it’s like walking extra 1000yards”, said Arnold (Daniel) Palmer expressing his concern on the weather.

There is now strong speculation that in the Augusta National GC where the greens are softened, bold and long hits will be more decisive factors than accurate puttings. All the greens are equipped with high tech “Sub Air” drainage systems, but the reputation of being glassy green has already flinched on the weather.

Players who can not hit far will face a great difficulty as the balls do not roll smoothly on the soggy fairways. They feel the total of 7,290 yard course seem to be longer than over 8,000 yards.

“If you’re not under 32 and can hit 280, you’ve got no chance,” said Loren Roberts(48, U.S.)

On the other hand, it will be absolutely advantageous to a handful of other long-hitting players such as Woods, Davis Love Ⅲ(U.S), Phil Mickelson(U.S.), Ernie Els(South Africa). Particulary it will be a great chance for Love Ⅲ who can hit the ball high and long.

Also miss shots are expected to occur because the ball with full of mud can not guarantee direction. The club however made it clear that players can not clean their

Young-Sik Ahn ysahn@donga.com