Don't Forget the Sandwiches

In professional golf, the way to a man's success appears to be through his stomach. Gary Player will go on for hours about the nutritive values of raisins. Jack Nicklaus dotes on oysters, consuming as many as six dozen at a sitting. Billy Casper, the year's top money winner ($81,515 so far) swears by a diet of buffalo steak and mooseburger. Last week at Akron's Firestone Country Club, Al Geiberger, 28, won the big gest prize of his seven-year pro career --the $25,000 P.G.A. championship -- and announced that he owed it all to peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches.

A University of Southern California graduate, he is so skinny (at 6 ft. 21 in., 160 lbs.) that he could paint himself silver and go to a party as a No. 1 iron. Geiberger started carrying sandwiches around in his golf bag when he was paired with Arnold Palmer in a tournament last year. "I knew I would never get near the refreshment stands because of Arnie's Army," he says, "so I had my wife make me up a lunch." He wound up winning $59,699 in 1965. Nibbling sandwiches between shots, Al insists, has a tranquilizing effect: "If I don't eat I get nervous, and when I get nervous I make bad decisions." Why peanut butter and jelly? "If you forget and leave them in your golf bag," says Al, "you can still eat them the next day. You can't do that with egg."

Familiar Nemesis. As it turned out, just about everybody could have used a little quick energy last week. Akron's monstrous (7,180 yds.) Firestone course is a familiar nemesis to the touring pros: it has been the site of eleven tournaments in six years, and only five players have ever broken par for 72 holes on its narrow fairways.

Geiberger kind of liked Firestone. With the help of his trusty sandwich, Al won last year's American Golf Classic at Akron, and he MOORE celebrated his return last week by firing a two-underpar 68 in the first round--while pre-tournament Favorites Palmer and Nicklaus were scoring 75s and Bobby Nichols, the 1964 P.G.A. champion, was shooting a horrendous 81. A second-round 72 left Geiberger one stroke off the pace set by doughty old (54) Sam Snead; but Snead was suffering from a painfully pulled groin muscle, dropped six strokes behind next day when Al shot his second 68.

The only thing Geiberger had to worry about after that was running out of peanut butter and jelly. He polished off two sandwiches during the last 18 holes, shot a steady 72 for an even-par total of 280 and a four-stroke victory.

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