Despite having made a record 52 appearences in a row at the Masters up to 2009, Gary Player has admitted he expects to be unduly nervous on Thursday when he tees up once again at Augusta National.
For this time, he will be joining old rivals Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus, the orginal Big Three, on the elite list of Honorary Starters that golf fans attending the tradition-rich tournament so adore.
Palmer took up the honour, which involves a former star player hitting the first drive of the tournament shortly after the crack of dawn and then standing aside, in 2007 and Nicklaus joined him three years later.
Player, at 76 six years younger than Palmer but four years older than Nicklaus, said that he had had no hesitation about taking up the offer to be an honorary starter when it came.
“But I’m already trying to control myself,” the little South African said.
“Oviously you have to feel a little bit nervous. It’s on television and people are watching, and you want to hit the best drive of the three, so you have to be a little bit nervous.”
Particularly emotional for Player will be the experience of once again joining forces with Palmer and Nicklaus, who together did so much in the 1960s to usher in the modern era of golf.
“Between us, we won over 350 golf tournaments around the world and we grew up, we played together and competed against each other, we have great love for each other and great respect for each other, and now to be teeing off on Thursday morning is a great honor for me,” he said.
Player will become the ninth designated Honorary Starter since the Masters asked Jock Hutchison in 1963.
After Hutchison there followed Fred McLeod, Byron Nelson, Gene Sarazen, Ken Venturi and Sam Snead before Palmer stepped forward in 2007, after a five years hiatus in the tradition.
A great enthusiast over the history of the sport, Player said he vividly remembered Hutchison teeing off in 1963 and then he admired Snead’s famously sweet swing in later years.
But he was less than complimentary about recent developments in the game, railing against the technological advances in ball and equipment which have made 300-yard plus drives commonplace and calling for a ban on long putters.
“What perturbs me is that with this distance going on, it can hurt golf, because the average club says, well, we’ve got to lengthen our golf course. They’re driving a 7-iron on a par-5.
“So they all get together and lengthen the golf course. More water, more fuel, more labor, more machinery, and the costs go up.
“And they say, oh, we have to levy the members and the members don’t like it, and the members resign. And that’s why golf has declined, because these people have gone the wrong way.”