Jaime Diaz's column on the Tour's slow play brought several letters, including that of Steven Roby of Glendale, Arizona:

I wanted to compliment Jaime Diaz on his fine back page piece in Golf World about slow-play! I realize his article was about the professionals, however, he failed to point out the single biggest problem for slow-play at the weekend municipals for us amateurs -- playing from the back tee markers when your absolutely shouldn't be.

When Joe 20-handicap-amateur steps up to the 225 yard par 3, he doesn't have a chance of hitting that green. It just bogs down everything while he struggles to make his double. The regular men's tee yardage of 178 yards is plenty challenging enough, don't you think?

Please people, if you are not a certifiable 10-handicapper or less, don't play from the "pro" tees. If we all moved up a set of markers, I'll promise you two things: 1) The pace of play will be much faster and 2) we will all enjoy our round so much better.

Luzviminda G. Veloso of Ridgewood, New York, had a similar reaction:

I want to thank Mr. Jaime Diaz for finally addressing "Slow Play" at the PGA. I believe I sent an e-mail to Mr. Hawkins about the same subject. He is dead on when he mentioned the LPGA. I watch their plays, too, and the ladies do not spend too much time practicing their strokes. They are more efficient in terms of positioning themselves and hitting their balls. Trevor Immelman made me fill like shouting during the Masters. I don't blame Rory Sabatini when he seemed to act rudely when he played with Ben Crane.

We're right to push the pros--for the record, the Players final round took four hours, forty minutes in twosomes--but the pro game need not affect our own, and yet we let it. When Peter Kostis praises a player for looking at a putt from all angles, we wince, because we know we'll see a 20-handicap circling his 40-footer the next time we play on the weekend. It was refreshing to watch Brandt Snedeker, whose model is Tom Watson, play so crisply at the Masters. He's a guy we ought to emulate.

--Bob Carney

Ohioan Tom Howenstine has had it with five-hour rounds and he blames the pros. I'm sure he had a fit yesterday watching Phil Mickelson take two and a half minutes to pull the trigger on one of the Stadium's par 3s:

Slow play by the pros have done more to ruin the game than anything else. Of course it provides the networks with really cheap air time at no added expense. Think about it. Imagine yourself playing in a twosome with two caddies and galleries to find any errant ball, and it takes 5 hours to play a round. Put a time limit from when a player starts and when he can finish. Penalize him a stroke for every 10 minutes over his time limit. A time limit would also add another dimension to the sport that it needs. These measures would speed up play not only at the pro level but also for us amateurs. Everyone says people won’t play golf now because of the time involved. Now a round of golf on a weekend ruins the whole day due to slow play, where it should take no longer than half a day.

Thanks, Tom. Good item on slow play and player Matthew Goggin's comments about it on Geoff Shackelford's blog.

Your comment on people leaving the game because of the time reminds me of something a friend who belongs to a nine-hole family club in Connecticut told me the other day. He said that having only nine holes used to be a disadvantage in recruiting new members. "Now it's an advantage," he says.

--Bob Carney

Bill Fields has won lots of support for his run for the presidency of golf. Two of latest supporters are Ohio reader Larry Nagy and highly-respected PGA professional Mike Hebron, of Long Island:

From Larry:

Fields for president! After reading Opinion, March 14 Bill Fields has my vote. Here are a couple more planks he might want to add to his platform. (1) Make the pros wear spikes in the retro silly-season event to give them a taste of chewed-up greens. (2) Ban the awkward terms “three-metal”, “fairway-metal”, “metal-wood”, etc, that TV announcers struggle with, and restore the perfectly good name for these clubs, i.e., the “spoon”. With these two planks Mr. Fields could run the gamut from the best (soft-spikes) to the worst (putting numbers on clubs) things ever to happen to the game of golf.

Research about the nature of learning finds that following “how to” directions does not fully engage the higher cortex in the brain, where learning takes hold. Studies also show when learning, "general ,just in the ballpark suggestions” give a greater return on investment... than technical information filled with details.

"Pleasurable Game for All" is what the PGA call letters should stand for. During the last 20 years the golf industry has focused on the perfect swing, the perfect ball, the perfect set of clubs, and I could go on. For many this focus on perfection has put aside the pleasure of playing the game. Trying for perfection can create frustrations and makes the game less inviting for individuals, which does not grow the game for the golf industry.

Mike, I love that last comment. You know a lot more about the learning part than I do. But I know that it's a game of walking with a bit of swinging interspersed. Our obsession with that second part has sometimes kept us from enjoying the second. Thanks.

--Bob Carney

John Chansky of Framingham, Mass., writes on the game's and the tour's nemesis: slow play. He likes what he sees on the LPGA Tour. The PGA Tour not so much.

Once again the LPGA trumps the PGA and no one notices. Last year it was drug testing, this year it is slow play. A few weeks ago Angela Park gets penalized for slow play, on a Sunday afternoon. During the WGC final when there are only two players on the course Tiger is quoted "who are we holding up?" after being warned of slow play. When will the PGA Tour wake up and starting being a leader instead of a follower? Let's start by hitting the players with some penalties. The average golfer is watching these guys line up every little thing and I have to be behind this bozo on the course as he lines up a two footer for a double bogey.

John, you know that Tiger Woods has made noise about this. Recently, so have Jerry Kelly and Adam Scott, among others who think the hammer has to come down on the big tour.

"Everyone knows who [the slow players] are," Jerry Kelly said. "We need to single them out."

"People play way, way too slow," Scott said during the Indian Johnny Walker tournament. "They need to hurry up. They should start penalising people. Just penalise them."

You may not like the way they spell penalize in Australia, but they are willing to do it. Personally, I wouldn't care about how fast they play on tour, except the foursome that plays in front of me every weekend seems determined to play at exactly the same pace.

--Bob Carney

Californian John Kaufman writes seeking advice. He wants to know how to cope with slow play delays:

I am an avid golfer but have a unique question to ask you. I have what I consider a very difficult problem with waiting on the tee box to hit my next tee shot due to a delay in play in front. I seem to lose my focus and the momentum when waiting on the tee to hit for a extended period of time. The longer I wait the worse I seem to get in my focus and momentum and as a result usually hit a bad shot when the time comes for me to hit.

I would REALLY appreciate any help or advise in overcoming this problem which I am sure I am not alone in with this dilemma. This would make a great article in a future article for Golf Digest, since this is an on going problem we all face from time to time.

Great question, John. Besides avoiding the situation in the first place by playing at times when play moves quickly, here's what our mental-side experts have said over the years.

Don't try to concentrate throughout the wait. Use it as a lesson in how to move your focus from broad to narrow and back again. That is, see if you can turn it on during the time you're hitting shots and off during the long waits. In your "down" time, move your attention elsewhere:

--Converse with your playing partners about something other than what a pain it is to wait on the golf course.

--Get into nature; observe the flora and fauna. (My friend Gene Westmoreland at the Metropolitan Golf Association, I recall, told me about the Great Blue Heron and a number of other birds we observed during one particularly slow round).

--Make it a practice session by chipping and putting to targets around the tee.

--Memorize golf jokes and practice telling them during the delays.

Love to hear other suggestions from readers on how they cope with these annoying delays....

--Bob Carney

Following our post yesterday on the subject of slow play, I present a couple of interesting letters touching on the subject. The first responds to Stina Sternberg's Ask Stina column in December.

A two-handicap woman complained about being forced to play the forward tees (we're getting to the slow play part) and Stina advised to grin and bear it:

I agree it would be nice if rangers could give you the benefit of the doubt, or at least watch you swing before telling you to move up, but you also have to keep in mind that they're just trying to do their job....Sadly there are plenty of golfers who insist on playing from yardages that are too long for their skill level. Seeing you at the whites might give the ranger pause the way seeing a man play from the tips does....

Stina Sternberg's response (Dec. 07) to the lady with the handicap of 2 was way off and perpetuates the male chauvinism and sexism of golf. She told her that she shouldn't be upset when the course marshal told her she had to play from the Red tees instead of the White tees that she preferred.

Unless I missed something in the USGA Rule Book, the tee placement is based on ability (handicap), not gender.

I believe we could reduce the amount of playing time if more marshals would make golfers play the tees that their handicap equates too. I have played several courses that require you to have a 10 or less handicap to play the back tees. Other courses have handicap recommendations (both men and women) for the tees.

I am a 20 handicap person who plays with one arm and scoliosis of the spine; I hit 70% of my fairways, but only hit the driver 150-170. I have played 28 years, always off the forward tees; I can't count the number of times I have played with guys who played the back tees only to dribble it past the forward tee. My belief is that if I can outdrive you from the forward tee….you are playing the wrong tees.

Several years ago Golf Digest tried to get more people walking with the belief that it would reduce playing time. I challenge Golf Digest to start a campaign to get courses to enforce a certain handicap for each of the tees. I think this would go a great way to reducing playing time.

Interesting idea, Thomas. We'll discuss it. The complication is that on our "country clubs for a day" courses, many of which are very difficult from any set of tees, it's difficult for a ranger to tell a player who's paid more than $100 where he or she will tee off, even if they would have more fun.

While we're on slow play, I retrieved this letter we received on the Sabbatini piece in November from Mark Walker, in Thailand.

Your November article of Rory's lost cool over the slow play of Ben Crane was for me refreshing. Yes it was rude, but isn't slow play the ultimate rudeness or at least equally so? I for one, was secretly then openly pleased with Rory's walk off. After all this is a sport that suffers with endemic slow play. Evidenced by the statement a few years ago by Bernhardt Langer at the British Open, that 5hours and 8 minutes was not enough time for a twosome to play a round of golf! Ugh. Three cheers for Rory!

"The ultimate rudeness" says it perfectly, Mark.

A friend of mine, our international editor John Barton, suggests this simple rule change to speed play. Its brilliance is in its simplicity.

Every swing counts as a stroke. That is, whether you make a swing with the intention to strike the ball or simply in "practice", it counts as one. Play a round that way. It will be refreshingly swift.

--Bob Carney