Ryan Fox’s Open win shows why public golf courses matter
Ryan Fox’s remarkable Open Championship victory at Royal Birkdale last week drove home something important: the special golfing landscape here in New Zealand and how much it has shaped his rise into the global superstar he’s become. Dame Lydia Ko’s story runs along similar lines.
Both Fox and Ko grew up with access to public courses such as Takapuna and Chamberlain Park. Go back a decade or three, and Michael Campbell and Sir Bob Charles had that same easy access to public facilities when they set out on their own paths to major championship success.
I wonder how many New Zealanders truly grasp the value of accessible public golf? As we saw last week, it gives thousands of kids the chance to take up the game, whatever their financial background. None of our four major champions came from money. Yet largely because public courses were there for them, we’ve consistently punched above our weight on the world stage.
Will that continue?
The game is growing, and encouragingly, much of that growth is among younger players, many of whom will spend their formative years at the more affordable public courses.
And yet councils keep chipping away at the few public courses we have, making way for housing developments, dog-exercise areas, or even drainage swamps.
I understand the pressures around housing and infrastructure. But there must be a way to meet those needs without sacrificing the very thing that has helped produce champions – and, just as importantly, given people from lower socio-economic backgrounds a way into a sport that delivers so much: health, fitness, community and the broader benefits that come with a more active society.
As a country, we have a habit of making short-term calls at the expense of long-term gain. If golf here loses its accessibility and turns into a “rich man’s sport” – as it has elsewhere – we all lose out.
Surely the people who hold the power to decide this can, just once, think long term and act together to protect our public golf courses. If they don’t, the next Ryan Fox might end up playing the game on a PlayStation instead – and we know where that road leads.
Michael Glading is the tournament director of the NZ Golf Open