What's with the waggles?

The experts are split on the cause and its effect on the infuriating pre-shot action Sergio Garcia has adopted, writes Julian Geraghty.

IF IT takes me a hundred regrips, it's all right I'm not going to hit a shot until I'm ready," Sergio Garcia said. "If it annoys you, don't look until you hear the click."

That was Garcia's advice to reporters last January in Maui, after he had won the Mercedes Championship with a four-round score of 274 and an aggregate of more than 4,000 fidgety, finicky, seemingly compulsive regrippings of his golf clubs. For reasons that were clear to no one, least of all Garcia himself, the 22-year-old Spaniard had in June of last year adopted a pre-shot routine based on the principles of Chinese water torture. A couple of conventional waggles, a swivel or two of the head to fix the target and then the regrips four times, five times ... eight, nine, 10 times ... 16, 17, 18 ... 25, 26, 27 ... 31, 32 times....