History for the toters as a major whine does the trick

Caddie's Role: The 87th US PGA Championship turned out to be a milestone in caddie history.

It was to be the major where the porters said enough is enough of the low-life treatment. I know that I have whined on at times about the basic conditions that often greet us at golf tournaments, but Baltusrol last week pushed most of us over the edge of tolerance.

After the marathon of the previous week in Denver, with a 36-hole final day, many caddies took the red eye to Newark and straight into action for the fourth major of the year. Players like to get plenty of practice rounds in at the big events. This usually makes sense as major courses tend to be more demanding and require more attention than most courses. So for many, despite the exhaustion of the trip, the show went on at a frenetic pace.

The first introduction to Baltusrol for us caddies was car-park C. To the logical mind, C wasn't that far down the alphabet, so it shouldn't have been too far from where we needed to be. On this occasion C was the initial for caddie, cur, cretin or cad and it was as far away as you could possibly be from where you needed to be. It was behind the 16th tee and over a mile walk to the clubhouse. There was an option of getting a shuttle which could take up to half an hour to get to the clubhouse as it actually went back outside the grounds onto the street.

I arrived there on Monday last just to pick up a yardage book so that I could convert it to metres. It was the usual major greeting, you don't have a pass you don't get in. The counter argument with the uncompromising security guard ensued. But the pass is inside, I need to get in to get it. Traditional major catch 22.

There was no other option but to park and walk and walk back. It was very warm last week in New Jersey. It was hotter and more humid than any locals ever remember in the Springfield and surrounding areas.

The caddie shack was the club bag-room with an awning set up outside it and a plastic porta-loo set on the side of a hill absorbing the heat of the day until it was so hot and oppressive that you could no longer use it by the afternoon. Those pooh-bins are gut wrenching under normal temperatures, with last week's weather they were positively inhumane.

The PGA made a half-hearted effort to feed us by dumping a few crates of sandwiches under the awning each day. There was no refrigeration and until the first complaint was made, nowhere to wash your hands before you handled one of the bread rolls. It was hot and sticky and generally uncomfortable at the caddie shack. It did not seem that it should belong to such a prestigious event as the PGA Championship.

Normally caddies, like most groups of people, moan amongst themselves, the converted when it comes to conditions. Rarely do we ever speak to the person responsible or anyone who can actually do something to change things. This year it all changed. It must have been the heat and the walk from the car-park after the half-hour trip from the caddies hotels that pushed us over the limit. Kerry Haigt, the man responsible for the tournament, from the US PGA has got to know a lot of caddies last week. Most of them he met in a less than complimentary mood in his office beside the car park that we were not allowed into.

One of my colleagues, after taking his players name tag off because it was plastic and makes you sweat even more in the 95 per cent humidity in New Jersey in August, had Mr Haigt approach him after three holes last Friday. He asked my colleague if he wanted to work in the event next year, to which he replied: "Next year. I don't know what I am doing next week." Which for some caddies is still the case.

Anyway he said he would display the sweaty tag if he promised him 10 minutes of his time after the round. His wish was granted and the 10 minutes was a rant that only a hot sweaty caddie can rustle up the enthusiasm for after the rigours of the second round of a major.

The only moment of light release from an otherwise damning diatribe from my colleague was when the clubhouse was mentioned. It is traditional at events in the States that we are not allowed in the clubhouse as a caddie. Until Sunday after the round when a player may require his caddie to pack his golf bag for him. This of course is the time you don't want to have access to the locker room.

My colleague's drift was that the patrons of the clubhouse were not really that special. "What do you think they are doing in the clubhouse? Listening to Mozart and discussing existentialism? This is the biggest clubhouse in the western world, there is room for caddies in there."

The diplomacy, caddie style, worked. By the weekend we were informed that we were now going to be allowed park in the officials car park next to the clubhouse. We would also have access to the clubhouse and that there were two complimentary passes for each cut-making caddie for the weekend to hand out to friends. Why it took such an amount of moaning to change all this is hard to comprehend. We are still, understandably, low down on the pecking order of priorities in organisers minds. A little bit of consideration and subsequent dignity goes a long way.

I have to wonder why all these basics are overlooked annually at these big events.

I also have to give Kerry Haigt, and the others responsible at the US PGA, credit for realising the error of their ways and being honest enough to admit that they had overlooked the toters conditions and offering such an olive branch at the weekend to keep us somewhat content.

I have every confidence that our circumstances in Medinah next year will be first class.