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 News from Around Banderas Bay | March 2006 
Champions Tour Cart Ban Lifted for Puerto Vallarta Golf Classic
 Bill Fields - Golf World
The Champions Tour Division Board voted this week to allow players to again use golf carts on the Champions Tour, beginning with the Puerto Vallarta Golf Classic Mar. 31-Apr. 2 in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico. The decision reverses a ban since the start of the 2005 season on carts in competitive rounds except at a couple of events featuring extreme heat or topography.
Carts still won't be permitted, however, at the senior circuit's five major championships plus the Wal-Mart First Tee Open at Pebble Beach, season-ending Charles Schwab Cup Championship and rounds that count in pro-am formats, including the Outback Steakhouse Pro-Am and Greater Kansas City Golf Classic.
Tour officials, led by PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem and Champions Tour president Rick George, saw getting rid of carts as as a way to enhance the tour's "fan friendly" approach, improve its image on television and emphasize competition over nostalgia. "Walking down the fairways rather than riding, it fits the direction of where our tour is going," George said in April 2004. "At this point we have every intention of staying the course because we think it's the right thing for our tour. But we're always listening."
In a statement released today, George said: "The tour continues to believe the presentation of our tournaments and the on-site fan experience is enhanced when competitions don't features carts and players walk. However, due to ongoing requests made by a number of players, we have concluded that carts will be made available on a more frequent basis to those wishing to use them."
Players choosing to take a cart may do so on the front nine, back nine or for the entire 18 holes. Caddies are permitted to drive a cart if the player elects to walk during competition.
The ban had rankled some players who preferred to keep an option that had been available since the tour began in 1980. The matter became a hot-button issue on tour, with polls that showed a majority of players in favor of allowing carts in contrast to the stand of their executive leadership. A larger survey conducted last year that included players, reporters and spectators revealed mixed opinions. There were occasional rumblings from players threatening legal action, but no lawsuits were filed.
As recently as last month the seniors' player advisory council was in favor of upholding the ban. But when the policy board met Monday in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., the group's four independent directors and the four player directors on the PGA Tour were swayed by the unanimous stance to return carts by Champions Tour player directors Jim Colbert, Ben Crenshaw, Tom Purtzer and Leonard Thompson, Purtzer told Golf World.
"If the players are 4-0 for something, they traditionally haven't been overridden," said Purtzer, a cart advocate who is plagued by a painful back condition. "It came down to the directors voting because they knew a majority of the players wanted carts back. A couple of the independent directors said they weren't in total agreement but appreciated the fight we had put up. It kind of came to down to the belief that 'you guys know what's best for your tour.'"
Purtzer said he hoped the policy reversal will allow some of the tour's legendary faces, such as Lee Trevino and Chi Chi Rodriguez, to play more. "Sure we're a competitive tour," Purtzer said, "but there's definitely some nostalgia involved, too. We know a number of guys are adamant against carts. We certainly don't have our chests puffed up. But it was something the four of us [player directors] felt was for the betterment of the tour."
Bill Fields is a senior editor for Golf World magazine. |
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