Free The Magnificent Masters: Jack Nicklaus, Johnny Miller, Tom Weiskopf, and the 1975 Cliffhanger at Augusta by Gil Capps Page B

Greensboro,” says Nicklaus, who then won the following two Masters.
    “Nothing against Greensboro, I felt my preparation was far better going to Augusta than playing a tournament,” he says. “I enjoyed going to Augusta—the peaceful quiet of nobody else there. Going out and playing and enjoying the golf course.
    “Would I rather win Greensboro or the Masters? Duh.”
    But Nicklaus, who wasn’t without superstitions, admits, “If I had played well at Greensboro and won the Masters, I probably would have said my preparation was playing the week before the tournament.”
    Golfers such as Weiskopf, Player, and Trevino preferred to play their way in. While they and others such as Miller and Palmer were in the Piedmont of North Carolina, on Wednesday, April 2, Nicklaus flew up from his home in the Lost Tree Village development of North Palm Beach, Florida, where he moved his family in 1965. Rising at 5:30 a.m., he made a stop in Atlanta for two morning business meetings before landing in Augusta that afternoon. He ate a bowl of oyster stew in the clubhouse before getting to work.
    Nicklaus liked to play at least four rounds on these sojourns. Sometimes he’d play nine in the morning, have lunch, then play the other nine in the afternoon. Other times, he would take his time and stay out all day—just he and caddie Willie Peterson, who had seen enough practice rounds to know whether Nicklaus was ready or not.
    Usually, he played by himself, but there were times he’d play with good friend and fellow tour pro Gardner Dickinson or maybe one of Augusta National’s two head professionals, Dave Spencer or Bob Kletcke, who had taken $4 off Nicklaus during a practice round at the 1956 U.S. Junior Amateur. Nicklaus never forgot it, but Kletcke always refused to let him play for those $4 back. Kletcke recalls one such pre-tournament round in which Nicklaus was a long way back on the par-five 13th. Even though he couldn’t see the green around the dogleg, he chose a 1-iron for the shot that demanded a high, towering hook. “I looked at Gardner, and he looked at me. And I shook my head ‘no,’ and he shook his head ‘yes’,” says Kletcke. It drew thirty yards, but fell just short of the green. Kletcke questioned Nicklaus, who responded by hitting the shot again, this time to ten feet. “That’s one of the greatest golf shots I’ve ever seen,” says Kletcke. “I never will forget it.”
    Hampered by one-and-a-quarter inches of rain on Thursday, Nicklaus got in just three rounds this time. He played his final practiceround with amateur George Burns on Saturday and struck the ball well from tee to green, shooting a 70. Peterson pronounced that his boss was in great form.
    “If I shot 276 or 277, I knew that I’d played fairly well to be able to do that. Generally speaking that was going to win the next week,” says Nicklaus. “I had a good week of preparation. Now I can enjoy my weekend and get away from the game, then come back. I’ve got all my preparation I need out of the way. I can just go play.”
    Nicklaus returned home Saturday evening, enjoyed some family time, and flew back up to Augusta Tuesday morning. So for him, the actual week of the Masters would almost follow the routine of a normal tournament.
    When asked if he was surprised no one consistently copied his routine of preparation for the majors, Nicklaus says slyly, “That was great.” Nicklaus was never going to be less prepared than anyone else. This gave him an added psychological advantage. “He almost thought he deserved to win,” says Johnny Miller.
    The trip in 1975 also gave Nicklaus the opportunity to test out a couple of new sticks around Augusta National. Nicklaus had been playing MacGregor golf clubs since age eleven and had the same set of VIP irons by Nicklaus—he had consulted on their design—in his bag since 1967. The set included a 1-iron through a pitching wedge—all with lead tape on the back and black leather grips with