No excuses for royal tara golfers

Ever wondered how an amateur golfer might get on if the hole he was aiming for just that little bit bigger?
Well at Royal Tara Golf Club on Friday over 100 players will descend on the Meath course and try to improve their score by shooting into a 15 inch hole in a new concepted promoted by club professional John Byrne.
The concept will make its competitive Irish debut at the Royal Tara Golf Club — host to the 2013 All-Ireland Cups and Shields finals — in an open tournament open to members and visitors.
Aside from dramatically reducing the amount of putts per round, Taylormade-Adidas Golf — which has already launched the concept in America — points to a whole range of positive spin-offs.
It reckons you will, on average, reduce your nine-hole score by four shots, complete your game in up to half the time and generally cut out all the stress of three-putting and six-foot knee knockers.
In a recent club competition at Royal Tara Byrne experimented with the 15-inch cup at the 18th hole, to interesting effect.
“The fear of missing putts is actually still there,” reported Byrne, an ambassador for Taylormade-Adidas Golf Ireland. “In fact, it’s more apparent as the cup is now more than three times bigger. Who wants to miss that in front of their mates? Of course, you still have to get to the green which we all know is a massive part of the game. Most importantly, it’s great fun.”
Byrne counts himself as a golfing ‘purist’ but believes the 15-inch hole idea has the potential to regenerate the game, renewing interest among dormant golfers and bringing out more first-timers.

(Thanks to Paul Keane for copy)