It was an intriguing week at the Australian Opens and we welcome Golf Australia magazine editor Brendan James into the studio to discuss his excellent post tournament column as well as lots of chatter about where the tournaments are and where they could go.

The men’s and women’s concurrent events will get the bulk of the attention but there will be some compelling golf played in the All Abilities Championship this week at Victoria Golf Club also. World Number 7 Kurtis Barkley joins the podcast to talk all this golf and disability including what he thinks will be an under par winning score at the AAC this week.

There is plenty of history surrounding this year’s concurrent Australian Opens, not the least being both host clubs – Kingston Heath and Victoria – have (or in Victoria’s case recently had) women Presidents. On today’s episode we welcome Nikki McClure (Kingston Heath) and Sue Hosking (Victoria GC President until recently) to talk all things preparation for the tournaments as well as women and the game in general. Add leading Australian golf writer Karen Harding to the mix and you have all the ingredients for an episode full of insight and eloquence (despite her suggestion the epsiode should be titled Three Women and a Baby!)

The eyes of the golf world will be firmly fixed on Australia for the next two weeks as both the Australian PGA and dual Australian Opens are payed out with some of the biggest names in the game in attendance. There’s chat about that plus sportswashing and the Qatar World Cup, what percentage of Americans believe they could win a fight against a chimpanzee and even a bit of golf chat.

Returning to one of Good-Good’s favourite topics – the role of media in golf – we return to one of Good-Good’s favourite past guests – Bill Fields.

Bill Fields maybe as close as golf gets to being graced with journalistic royalty. Among a list of remarkable writing credits Bill is a former editor of Golf World, a noted golf photographer (his photo of Larry Mize winning the 1987 Masters was the cover image of “Best Sports Stories 1988”) he is also the recipient of the 2020 PGA Lifetime Achievement Award in Journalism.

The 2023 changes to the Rules of Golf were announced this week and one change in particular caught our interest – the introduction of Rule 25 for Golfers with a Disability. It’s an important statement regarding the inclusivity of the Rules of Golf and the accessibility of the game and who better to talk to than James Gribble the CEO of Empower Golf – a full service not-for-profit organisation whose mission is to facilitate and promote golf for people living with disabilities.

The game has never known such turbulent times at the professional...

There’s reader mail this week wondering if the Good Good team is too hard on golfers? it’s a fair question (and took up more of the discussion than expected) plus professional golf is coming to a town near you and why you should make the effort to go and watch it.

Golf faces multiple problems but among its most serious is the perception that it is an environmentally irresponsible use of land. While the game can – and is – improving in this area it is important golfers and non-golfers alike are aware of the message. Sam Thomas of the GEO Foundation for Sustainable Golf joins the pod to talk Sustainable Golf Week and the game’s future.