KEY POINTS:
From a distance, there is no way of telling that Sir Bob Charles is no longer a young man.
The height is still there, there is no stoop, the athleticism is obvious and then there is the fact that he strides along the fairway at a clip which
left his playing partner yesterday, Henry Epstein, in his wake.
It's only when you get close and clock the silver barnet snaking from under the hat that it becomes apparent the specimen being viewed is older than assumed.
His golf is certainly no giveaway. The effortless grace of the Charles swing is still a joy.
There's no fussiness, no prolonged agonising about club selection and no endless practice swinging.
That's not to say he's not meticulous. The yardage card is forever in his hand. Everything is calculated but doesn't appear so.
With a big, mainly blue-rinse gallery following his every move yesterday, Charles strolled around without a care in the world.
That languid swing of his kept propelling the ball where it was supposed to go and a little magic in the short game tidied things as he went.
His round came to life on the third when he nailed a mid-iron approach to within four feet and drained the birdie putt.
On the fourth he made a swing that showed that timing remains everything.
While his partner - good enough to be an international skier - thundered into the ball with all the explosiveness required of the modern-day power golfer, Charles made a classic tick-tock swing.
The former pulled his ball into the left-hand greenside bunker while the latter floated his three feet from the pin. And yet, the 71-year-old showed he remained in touch with the modern world on the seventh when his drive started a little left and showed no signs of hauling itself back to the intended path.
"Hook, hook," shouted Sir Bob, "bend it like Beckham."
The old timers loved it.
This confirmed their collective view that they were in the presence of a genuine Kiwi sporting legend. A man who has achieved on the international stage without ever forgetting the qualities that got him there in the first place.
A clumsy approach on the last threatened to rain on his parade but Sir Bob isn't one to get flustered. He came out the side of the bunker, chipped on happily enough and drained the eight footer for a round of 71.
That kept him chipper - these days he reckons he's done a good day's work if he shoots his age.
