THE Glasgow Herald’s golf correspondent, Raymond Jacobs, put it thus, in October 1981: “What with keeping a pipe burning in the snell wind, consuming brandy at the turn for central heating, and quenching his thirst from a can of beer ... it hardly seemed possible for Brian Barnes to have any concentration left for winning the Drybrough Scottish Professional Golf Championship at Dalmahoy for the first time”.
Yet win Barnes did. With a final round of 67 he wrested the title from the holder, Sam Torrance, finishing with a 72-hole total of 275, 13 under par. His prize for winning was £4,000.
"Barnes thereby completed a season that had otherwise been relatively barren", added Jacobs.
"Only five weeks ago he came to the Midlothian course without a victory and having lost his Ryder Cup place. Whereupon he won the Tournament Players’ Championship, worth in itself £10,000, but also the passport into the World Matchplay Championship, from which he emerged £5,000 the richer".
Brian Barnes died in September 2019, aged 74. He had recorded nine wins on the European Tour and made six appearances against USA in the Ryder Cup between 1969 and 1979. In 1975, in Pennsylvania, he pulled off the difficult feat of beating Jack Nicklaus twice in one day.
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