ANWA competitor roasted for slow play, but step back. There's more to her story than meets the eye
USC junior Bailey Shoemaker was criticized on social media when it took her more than a minute to swing on a shot in the Augusta National Women's Amateur. She has admitted having a mental block after suffering through severe pain
The clock was ticking. Ten seconds went by. Then 20.
One near pull of the trigger. More seconds. A waggle this time.
It kept ticking, and when the Golf Channel camera had stayed on Bailey Shoemaker for more than a minute, it was fair to wonder if she would ever hit her shot in the Augusta National Women’s Amateur. Shoemaker, a junior at USC who was profiled by Golf Digest on Tuesday, eventually would make seven swings or waggles before hitting her tee shot on the par-3 eighth hole at Champions Retreat, and the time spent on the stopwatch manned by those staring at the TV came to about 1 minute, 16 seconds. Predictably, social media almost instantly went nuts, with derogatory remarks, and comments like “brutal” and, “This is a major problem in the woman’s game.
They need to fix this. ” Anybody who plays golf at any level knows that slow play is one of the game’s biggest problems, and also one of its toughest to solve because there is no shot clock. And when it happens at an elite level, the belief is that it only serves to validate deliberate play for everyone.