DOES RORY HAVE SENSITIVE SKIN?

Does Rory have sensitive skin?

It is a known fact that synthetic apparel; polyester, nylon can act as an irritant to your skin, because they are derived from petroleum and full of nasty chemicals.

But if the rumours are correct and Rory takes a mega-buck deal to wear sweatshop apparel filled with toxins for another ten years, at least he can afford to buy buckets of ointments to help combat itchy, blotchy skin.

Alternatively he could insist upon wearing natural fibres such as hemp, bamboo and organic cotton.

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BLACK BALL OFFER

Grab yourself a stylish stocking filler for Christmas.

The original black golf ball caused quite a stir in the conservative golf industry when first launched by Golf Refugees.

Designed to perform in hot sunny conditionals, with its heat-absorbing ultra-thin black cover it feels warmer to the touch than traditional reflective white balls.
http://www.golf-refugees.com/balls_black.html

The original black ball currently holds the Guinness World Record for the farthest golf shot caught in a moving car. Mercedes Benz and ex Formula One driver David Coulthard selected to use the original black ball, for its exceptional distance capabilities and higher visibility through the air, for their World Record ‘Catch’ attempt this summer.

http://www.golf-refugees.com/video_blackball.htm

Only 3 pounds/3.5 euros/4.5 dollars per sleeve of three black balls excluding delivery.

Just e-mail your order stating 'black ball offer' to refugees@btinternet.com
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96 PER CENT

Who designed a swept hosel for a golf club head?

As soon as we found out Callaway Golf were making claims regarding a swept aerofoil hosel for a golf club head we contacted their IP Counsel to remind them Golf Refugees had already designed, tested and proved the concept several years before.

We reminded Callaway they had supplied a wind tunnel model to help us perform comparative wind tunnel tests, held e-mail conversations with their VP of Design & Innovation and taken out design patents in the USA.

Over the past few weeks we have been conducting a poll on our blog; asking readers to vote on who they believed designed a swept aerofoil hosel for a golf club head?

Poll results are currently showing; 96% of you believe Golf Refugees designed the swept aerofoil hosel.

We would like to thank you all for voting and for your support.

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TRAFFIC LIGHT LABELLING

Golf Refugees have made a formal submission to the EU to consider a proposal for adopting voluntary traffic light labelling on all sports apparel.

Earlier this year the EU admitted that its regulatory system currently fails to take into account the chemical cocktail to which we are exposed when assessing the safety of chemicals in our clothing, as it's mainly based on a single substance approach.
 
After testing this summer the EU concluded that the risk of migration of hazardous substances from fabric to our skin increases with sports shirts as they are used during perspiration-inducing activities and come into direct contact with the skin, our largest organ.

The proposed traffic light system would provide consumers with an easy to read label specifying high, med and low content levels for the most widely used heavy metals and chemicals in the manufacture of sports apparel.
 
Please let Golf Refugees and the EU know your thoughts.
 
Be aware of what you wear.

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BMX OFFER

Leave the BMW on the driveway and ride your BMX bike to the golf course.

All of our t-shirts are ethically made using organic cotton and manufactured solely from wind and solar energy for carbon neutral status.

http://www.golf-refugees.com/tshirts3.htm

We only have a few left, so grab yourself a bargain; 8 pounds/10 euros/12 dollars per shirt excluding delivery.

Just e-mail your order stating ‘bmx offer’ to;

refugees@btinternet.com

Black or dark brown tee shirt with white screen printed graphic.

Men’s sizes;

S

M 

L

XL

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NO LOCAL HERO

The film-maker Bill Forsyth has claimed that people living next to Donald Trump's golf course have suffered from "malign, egotistical bullying" and "craven" political behaviour comparable to living in communist-era Romania.

In an article for the Guardian Forsyth said there were striking parallels between the experiences of Trump's neighbours in Aberdeenshire and the fictional disputes in his cult classic Local Hero involving a US billionaire who wants to buy a remote Scottish beach and village.

The director, who won a Bafta for Local Hero in 1983, said that a highly critical documentary on the Trump golf course called You've Been Trumped, which will be broadcast on UK television for the first time this Sunday, had left him "dazed and shocked".

Forsyth, right, said: "We're watching real lives and livelihoods mercilessly put to hazard by a malign concoction of egotistical bullying, corporate muscle flexing, craven averting of gaze by national politicians and crass misreading of events by local authorities including police."

The documentary, which recorded Trump's neighbours losing their water supply, having vast earth walls built outside their homes and the film-makers arrested, was "a moving depiction of human survival and dignity amidst murky doings akin to seventies Romania."

Many cited Local Hero after one of Trump's most stubborn neighbours, Michael Forbes, resisted the property developer's repeated efforts to buy and demolish his home to expand the golf resort. Trump said Forbes's home was a "pigsty" and a "slum" and called Forbes "dirty" and "a loser".

In 2010, Lord Puttnam, who produced Local Hero with Forsyth, emerged as one of 60 protesters against the course who had bought small parcels of land from Forbes to thwart attempts to compulsorily purchase Forbes's home.

Forsyth writes that Trump emerged from the documentary as an unsophisticated, shallow "Johnny One Note" whose character "would have very limited utility in a sophisticated fictional drama. That's not to deny his usefulness elsewhere, say in a comparatively primitive or cheap drama."

Trump reacted to news that the documentary was being shown on BBC2 by launching a tirade on Twitter against its director, Anthony Baxter, and other "morons" who criticised his now mothballed £750m resort, which was to be built at the course.

Trump stated: "All the morons that cause the controversy in Scotlandhave made my development far more successful than anticipated."

He then added that the film, which has now been screened in US cinemas and was acclaimed by the radical filmmaker Michael Moore, had helped him "promote & make Trump International Golf Links Scotland so successful you stupid fool!" In another tweet, he told Baxter: "Your documentary has died many deaths. You have, in my opinion, zero talent."

The documentary's broadcast on Sunday night is an awkward piece of timing for the first minister Alex Salmond, once an influential supporter of Trump's £750m plan for a major golf resort in his Aberdeenshire constituency.

The Scottish National party wraps up its annual conference in Perth on Sunday, and the broadcast follows a fresh row over Salmond's formerly close relationship with Trump.

It emerged last week the first minister had written privately to Trump seeking his public support for the controversial decision to release Abdelbaset al-Megrahi, the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing. Trump refused.

The pair have since fallen out publicly over Trump's repeated attacks on a government-backed offshore windfarm test site planned near his estate north of Aberdeen. Those intensified on Tuesday after Trump's lawyers threatened again to sue Scottish agencies supporting the windfarm proposal.

Trump's executive vice president and counsel, George Sorial, would not comment directly on Forsyth's remarks but said Baxter's film was "a gross misrepresentation of the facts."

Sorial said the project was widely supported by local people, business leaders and local politicians.
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GRAFFITI GOLF BALL OFFER

The best value 3-piece ball in golf.

Only 5 pounds/6 euros/7.5 dollars excluding delivery, per dozen box.

First golf ball designed with graffiti style graphics.

http://www.golf-refugees.com/balls_graffiti.htm >>

Just e-mail your order stating 'graffiti ball offer' to

refugees@btinternet.com

Limited stock available
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UNDERSTATEMENT

Sweatshop is an understatement (extracts from article by Jena Kehoe)

Earlier this year 29 people were killed in a garment factory in Bangladesh; the factory is used by many well-known American clothing brands including Tommy Hilfiger. Electrical wiring overloaded by sewing machines is said to have sparked the fire. Dozens of textile workers who were breaking for lunch on the roof were unable to descend smoke-filled stairwells. Several were forced to make ropes from rolls of fabric and attempt to scale down the side of the building.

When asked by ABC News backstage at his Fall 2012 show, the American designer claimed he’d moved his operations. “I can tell you that we no longer make clothes in those factories. We pulled out of all of those factories.”

Hilfiger corrected himself after the news outlet obtained shipping records for Tommy Hilfiger originating from the very same factories.

The director of the Worker Rights Consortium, Scott Nova, told ABC’s reporter that three workers were killed at factories responsible for producing Tommy Hilfiger in the past few weeks, and that the American companies hadn't delivered on their promises of safer labour conditions.

Anyone fancy wearing Tommy Hilfiger golf collection?

Can their sponsored golf professionals and agents just take the money and plead ignorance to the unethical sweatshop manufacturing? After all everyone else does.

Who has blood on their hands?
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BE AWARE OF WHAT YOU WEAR

Are golf professionals, their managers and consumers putting themselves at risk by not asking apparel brands a simple question? Does my golf shirt contain lead?

Lead has been found in the majority of synthetic polyester based moisture-wicking anti-bacterial sport shirt samples.

Exposure to lead is a concern for public health as it can have detrimental impact, even at very low levels, and no scientific safe limit values can be established. 

Lead is a suspected cause of cancer and disturbance of the hormonal system. Exposure to lead can cause problems with kidneys, infertility, stillbirth, brain damage and negatively impact upon the development of the nervous system.

The risk increases particularly with sport shirts as they are often used during perspiration-inducing activities and come into direct contact with the skin. Sweat and movement friction can facilitate the migration of hazardous substances from the fabric to our skin.

These are not our words but the words from the European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) who test products on behalf of the public.
 
However, when Golf Refugees asked to see the full report we were denied, as only the brands of the sample shirts tested and authorised bodies were given full access. We asked the UK authorised body, part of the Department of Trade and Industry, unfortunately they too declined.

Golf professionals and consumers probably just look for the cut, colour, feel and brand when endorsing or purchasing golf apparel, whilst the BEUC look for the following:

Lead

Chromium

Nickel

Antimony

Dibutyltin (DTD)

Nonylphenol ethoxylates (NPE’s)

Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH’s)

Arsenic
Formaldehyde

We would advise you to ‘Google’ any of the above heavy metals and chemicals to give you a better idea of what brands use to make your lovely golf apparel.

Is it time for golf professionals and their managers, golf magazines and consumers to start asking brands; what is in my golf shirt?

Are we stuck with being kept in the dark about what we are buying and wearing? 

I have never seen a description in a golf magazine apparel review saying ‘Here is the latest spring/summer collection from ‘such a brand’, with lead, arsenic and formaldehyde for added comfort and performance.

But that is actually what you are getting.

Be aware of what you wear.
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GOLF BANDIT OFFER

One of our most popular graphics ‘Bandit’ modelled here by the gorgeous Rossella.

All of our t-shirts are ethically made using organic cotton and manufactured solely from wind and solar energy for carbon neutral status.

http://www.golf-refugees.com/tshirts3.htm

We only have a few left, so grab yourself a bargain; 8 pounds/10 euros/12 dollars per shirt excluding delivery.

Just e-mail your order stating ‘golf bandit offer’ to;

refugees@btinternet.com

Light grey tee shirt with chocolate screen printed graphic.

Men’s size;

S

M – sold out

L – sold out

XL

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GOLF BALL UTOPIA

You are looking at golf ball utopia. You are also looking straight into the eyes of a fruit fly.

Modern ‘super’ golf balls are made from synthetic rubber; polybutadiene, which lose 20% of their energy with each bounce.

The humble fruit fly and other insects jump and flap there wings using natural super elastic protein; resilin. Natural resilin out-stretches and out-bounces every known human made material. Scientists in Australia have recently found a process to make synthetic resilin, which is almost perfectly elastic.

So there you are a golf ball made from synthetic resilin would be golf ball utopia. With its 97% resilience it would be the ultimate performance material. Golfers could see a distance improvement of 20%, and I’m not talking marketing hype, this is material science. Tee shots could reach over 400 yards, leaving most par 4’s a drive and chip shot.

But for us at Golf Refugees the real eureka moment is the fact synthetic resilin is biodegradable. All of those millions of lost high performance golf balls would simply biodegrade. Unlike today's synthetic rubber balls which stick around between 100 - 1,000 years.

Three cheers for the fruit fly and jumping fleas.

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BREATHE A LITTLE EASIER

There is always new technology just around the corner. I would like to get your opinion on whether you would wear the following to play golf.

Collaboration between fashion designers and scientists in the UK has created a nanotechnology that will provide apparel with the ability to purify the air as and when you wear it.

For example if you play on a golf course near a major freeway, near a major conurbation or just if you use your gas guzzling motor to bring yourself to the golf course, it provides a way to reduce your pollution simply by wearing the shirt to play golf. The golfer would not notice this air purification process as the interaction between the air molecules and the nanotechnology embedded in the garment fibres are invisible.

You may be aware most golf apparel today already contains many additional ‘chemical’ agents that are applied to the shirt to increase moisture-wicking, UV protection, anti-bacterial etc

Just imagine millions of golfers all over the world cleaning up air pollution as you play golf. But would you wear it?

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GET REAL DRESS CODES

It’s that time of year again for ‘conkers’, which brings me to that old chestnut of a topic; dress codes.

I have never fully understood why elderly men-folk insist they know best about what younger people should wear to play golf.

They must know that your taste in fashion changes through the decades.

I am sure one day (which is rapidly approaching), I will like wearing a navy blazer with gold-coloured turn-up pants with a striped shirt and tie in the clubhouse and pleated beige pants with an indescribable coloured polo shirt and jumper combo on the course.

So what are dress codes really for?

I keep hearing they are to maintain standards. Nothing wrong with trying to maintain standards.

Golf should be taking a leading role in supporting apparel standards.

I am not talking about superficial tit-bits such as the length of your summer socks or the tailoring of your shorts or the toss-up between a collared and a turtle-neck shirt.

 I am proposing that golf’s new dress code signs outside the clubhouses around the world should go for the jugular; ‘only ethically-made apparel in the clubhouse’, ‘no sweatshop apparel on the course’. Apparel which is made by textiles workers who are paid a ‘living wage’ and who have workplace health and safety standards to protect them from handling the hazardous toxic chemicals used to make moisture-wicking golf wear.

Now if these new dress code standards were introduced today, I appreciate that most golf pros and hackers would be butt-naked on the course.

And I can't think of a better image to highlight the need for golf to get real dress codes.

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JUNYA WATANABE

Apparently sportswear is a big trend at Paris Fashion Week.

Here’s a pic taken from Japanese designer Junya Watanabe’s Spring / Summer 2013 collection.

There is a strong case for wearing a helmet at golf events as some golf pros just can’t hit the ball straight.
If you get the chance to view the whole collection there are some fantastic designs. I especially liked the jackets and coats. My only gripe, they should have been made using recycled polyester.
But if I were a female golf pro with a few quid in my back pocket I'd be giving him a call.

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GAGGED

Have Golf Refugees been gagged?

This is the question we are asking from the owner of the No. 1 Golf Networking Group Online called Linked Golfers.

For some reason, all of our discussions and posts were removed this week, without any explanation. We are currently seeking an explanation.

Golf Refugees are members of numerous online golf groups where we post similar content. Hence we are a little bit baffled as to why our content has suddenly been black balled from this particular LinkedIn Group.

We appreciate that we do have a propensity to say things which the mainstream golf industry and brands do not agree with.

For example we feel that golfers and golf pros who wear polyester based moisture-wicking shirts are largely unaware of the toxic heavy metals and chemicals used to make such apparel. It just so happens that The European Consumer Organisation agree with us.

Our most recent posts concerned the rowdy crowd at the Ryder Cup, which we felt breathed life into tournament golf and we loved the golfers and spectators expressing themselves on the tees at Medinah.

It is also true to say that Golf Refugees UK have been in disputes with Nike and more recently Callaway Golf over product ideas. Golf Refugees designed the original heat-absorbing black golf ball only to find out that Nike launched a similar product a few years later in the USA.

Golf Refugees also designed the swept aerofoil hosel for a golf club head. Again we provided our wind tunnel test results, images plus our still active US design patent as proof to Callaway Golf and their London based lawyers.

But it seems when you are an irreverent voice the vested interests of the Golf Industry can still place a strip of gaffer tape across your mouth.
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GOLF'S BEASTIE BOYS - BUBBA POULTER AND KEEGAN

The latest Ryder Cup should change tournament golf forever.

But it wont, unfortunately. For the ‘stick-in-the-muds’ will still have their way. 

Bubba, Poulter and Keegan proved that pro's can play great golf with a raucous crowd.

So let’s swap the 'quiet please' signs for ‘make some noise’ signs and encourage spectators to express themselves just as Bubba and Poulter did on the tees at Medinah.

The days of teeing off in silence should be over.

Future golf tournaments should see greater spectator participation and noise levels to worry the local authorities.

‘Make some noise if you’re with me’ – Beastie Boys
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FOR THE USA TEAM

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