Remnants of Arnie's Army Fall in for the Final Masters March

When Arnold Palmer arrived at Augusta National for the first time in the spring of 1955 he felt a profound sense of relief. After spending the winter playing his way around the rain-soaked southern circuit he was delighted to find himself in such civilised surroundings.

"In some cases," he said this week, "I'd been starting a golf course at 5ft 10in and ending up at 6ft because the mud on my shoes had built up a couple of inches. And there was no grass on the greens. So to get here, where everything was impeccable, was beautiful."

He came to the tournament as the US amateur champion and had just turned pro. A final round of 69 not only put him in a tie for 10th place and gave him a $696 cheque but provided the prelude to a relationship with the US Masters that changed the face of golf.

Palmer was out on the course yesterday, playing a practice round prior to competing in the Masters for the 50th and last time in his life. "It's not easy to say that," the 74-year-old Palmer mused. "But there's all kinds of reasons why this should be the end."

Golf fans will remember that he said the same thing two years ago, before turning the opening rounds of that Masters into a grand farewell tour of a course on which he tasted victory in 1958, 1960, 1962 and 1964.

Past champions receive a lifetime invitation to the Masters and the sight of gnarled old men teeing off outside the elegant white clubhouse is a charmingly poignant one. But their presence inevitably slows down the field, as it would if Stirling Moss, Palmer's contemporary, were invited to compete in the 2004 British grand prix. The problem was recognised in 2002 when Hootie Johnson, the club chairman, withdrew the invitations from three older champions. Palmer took the hint and announced his decision not to return. "My golf has been pretty lousy of late," he said. "It doesn't warrant me being here playing."

A year later he changed his mind. He wanted to go for a half-century of consecutive appearances and he wrote to Johnson asking him to rescind a new rule which ended a champion's right to compete after the age of 65. This was emotional blackmail that Johnson, so resolute in resisting pleas to admit women members, could not withstand.

And so on Monday the mayor of Augusta presented Palmer with the keys to the city. Today and tomorrow he will be followed from tee to green by the last battalion of Arnie's Army, the procession that announced its presence during his first victory in the Masters.

He was 28 then and on the brink of establishing himself as the first golfing hero of the television age. An eagle at the long 13th, the most beautiful and spectacular hole on the course, took him into the lead on the final round.

If his subsequent victories entered the tournament's legend, so did his defeats at the hands of Gary Player in 1961, when his double-bogey on the final hole handed victory to the ambitious young South African, and of Jack Nicklaus in 1963, when Palmer's reign as the world's greatest player began to come to an end.

A labourer's son from a Pennsylvania steel town, he became the first golfing millionaire, the first to fly his own jet from tournament to tournament and the first to make a second career as a course designer.

With the aid of Mark McCormack, a young agent who unlocked the marketing potential of his swashbuckling style and open nature, Palmer not only took golf to a new audience but created the template for every modern sports idol.

He has not made the cut here since 1983, which was also the last time he produced a below-par round. But his 50 consecutive appearances, including a year in which he recov ered from prostate cancer surgery in time to accept his invitation, represent a record that is unlikely to be matched.

"I suppose it's a bittersweet-type situation," he said of the next two days. His caddie for the tournament will be Sam Saunders, his 16-year-old grandson, who won the members' championship at Bay Hill, Palmer's own club, last year.

"He's like any 16-year-old," Palmer said. "Taking a week off school for this is a big deal. He's going to get a look at something that he might be doing for the rest of his life, and I don't mean caddying. I hope it's a lesson to him."

And for himself, someone asked: out of the whole marvellous story, which had been his very best day on a golf course?

"A single day?" A half-beat pause, and a slow smile. "I've had 50 years of single days."