Winter. Temporary greens, squishy tees and (worst of all) trolley bans. We thought we’d just fantasise a bit about things to come. In our opinion things officially kick off the weekend we sit and watch the US Masters. So in celebration of that sofa-based event, here’s a bit of fore play for the proceedings. We’ll be warming up here ready for April 6th at Augusta with a regular bit of gossip/trivia/general frippery.
But for today – Ryo Ishikawa, 17 year old extraordinarily talented player who’s burst onto the Japanese scene, got a phone call to invite him to play at the Masters. You have to love his reaction;
“It would be rude for someone like me to speculate about where I would finish at the Masters. I’m not on the same level as Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson but I would like to meet them.” Ishikawa added: “I don’t to think too much about it. I just want to play well. If just one person says ‘Nice shot!’ or remembers my name I’ll be happy.”
Ryo, you’ve got our vote.
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Thanks for your warmhearted comments on Ryo. In addition to his well-known unassuming demeanour, I’ll describe some other aspects of Ryo, which may have not been introduced beyond Japan.
Ryo has “high level of ambition, unchanged mind and continuous effort to achieve it”, which is the main reason for the support with enthusiasm by Japanese people. Although he won a Japanese tour tournament along with two times of runner-up in the last year, it must have been unexpected by both Ryo and the other pro players. Japanese golf courses are smaller than ones used in US PGA tour. Therefore, technique is more required rather than long drive to compete in the Japanese tour. However, Ryo mostly used the driver at the tee in long and mid holes, and sometimes as the second shots. For Ryo, this was not to compete in the Japanese tournaments, but to raise his competitive ability toward US PGA tour and the Masters in the future. Some pro players said that Ryo had no course management and was reckless.
The turning point was come in the Japan Open in October 2008, which was held a difficult course with narrow fairways surrounded by massive pine trees and strong coastal wind. Ryo declared to use always the driver (except for short holes) before the tournament and did it as planned, which surprisingly resulted in the runner-up. The famous master players such as Aoki and Jumbo Ozaki praises Ryo’s daring playing style and also criticized the technique-deviated play, which has not been effective in US PGA tour, by the most of Japanese pro players. Since that time, some top pro players have been affected by Ryo’s daring style.
Ryo says “I’m always exercising as the most unskillful player toward the secondly unskillful one”. I can say now that Ryo is the biggest person encouraging Japanese people in this gloomy times.
Detailed description on Ryo is shown on the following web-site, unfortunately in Japanese.
http://ryo.panasonic.co.jp/insidereport/index.html
Let’s see how Ryo shows his playing style. to us
Was watching him in a Japanese tournament just before Christmas. He’s a talent alright, one to watch for sure, although I think he’s gonna hurt himself at some point, the way he swings that driver……… :-)
Still looking forward to following him though.