Augusta Masters

Another splendid article in the Observer Sport Monthly - this one about Augusta National golf club. I had been mistaken in thinking it was a racist club, based on some prejudiced article I'd read in the build-up to a previous year's tournament, when there was some sort of controversy over women being excluded from club membership. David Owen argues convincingly that Augusta merely reflects the racial balance of the sport as a whole in the US. I didn't know that the club and the tournament struggled to establish themselves before to WWII. I agree that it is such a special tournament because it shuns the overtly commercial branding of some major sporting events and because it is played on the same course every year. I've always appreciated how proud it is of its history and how much that is a part of the tournament.