Tag: 151st British Open

Rory McIlroy feels he still has chance of winning 151st Open despite Friday’s 70

The world No. 2 did not build significantly on his level-par opening round as he shot a one-under 70 on Friday.

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Rory McIlroy believes he still has a chance of winning the 151st Open despite failing to make a serious move in his second round at Royal Liverpool.

The world number two did not build significantly on his level-par opening round as he shot a one-under 70 on Friday.

That left him nine shots off the clubhouse lead held by Brian Harman but, even though he has much ground to makeup, he is not writing off his chances.

“I might be nine back, but I don’t think there’s going to be a ton of players between me and the lead going into the weekend,” said the 34-year-old, who is bidding to end a nine-year wait for a fifth major title by winning for a second time at Hoylake.

“It depends what the conditions are tomorrow and obviously depends what Brian does as well.

“Right now it’s not quite out of my hands. I think if I can get to three, four, five under par tomorrow going into Sunday, I’ll have a really good chance.”

McIlroy produced a strong finish on Thursday by saving par on the par-five fifth after hitting bunker trouble.

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He looked to have carried some momentum into his second round with two early birdies but they were cancelled out by bogeys on the back nine.

Yet he got a shot back with another birdie on the 18th and, despite his frustrations, was happy enough with his performance.

McIlroy said: “It played really, really tough. Ten under par is unbelievably impressive out there.

“We’ll see what the weekend holds but I’m actually pretty happy with my two days’ work.

“I don’t think I have to do anything differently. I’m hitting the ball well from tee to green.

“I’ve missed a couple of chances on the greens and the wind got me today.”

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Lynch: Softening bunkers at the Open is a lame attempt to legislate luck out of links golf

The timing of this change is as controversial as the change itself.

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HOYLAKE, England — Most of the 156 competitors in the field at the 151st Open Championship have an opinion about the 80-odd pot bunkers that litter Royal Liverpool like landmines, and few of them are effusive. The word “penal” hasn’t been used this often by a group of male jocks since autocorrect was invented thirty years ago.

Some players were sanguine about the challenges faced in the sand, including two whose misadventures on the final hole in the first round saw them either playing backward or pin-balling off the revetted sod walls.

“Proper penalty structures,” said Jon Rahm.

“You’re riding your luck,” said Rory McIlroy.

The trauma about traps owes to the fact that bunkers at Royal Liverpool aren’t maintained in a customary concave style, with sand slopes flashing up the walls to provide loft for escape and help balls roll toward the flat center of the hazard. Instead, bunker floors are flat or even slope slightly toward the walls, which are mostly perpendicular. This setup substantially increases the chances of a player finding his ball flush against the wall, or at the very least having to manufacture a body-bending stance seldom achieved by any athlete not working a balance beam.

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After multiple such occurrences on Thursday, the R&A lost its nerve and loosened the thumbscrews.

“Yesterday afternoon the bunkers dried out more than we have seen in recent weeks and that led to more balls running straight up against the face than we would normally expect,” Open organizers said in a statement Friday morning. “We have therefore raked all of the bunkers slightly differently to take the sand up one revet on the face of the bunkers. We routinely rake bunkers flat at most Open venues but decided this adjustment was appropriate in light of the drier conditions which arose yesterday.”

The timing of the change is as controversial as the change itself. Since the R&A admitted that conditions worsened during the first round, shouldn’t the same thing have been allowed to happen during the second round to ensure, as best as possible, that each side of the draw faced identical conditions? It’s almost enough to make one wish Sergio Garcia were in the field to lament injustice and favoritism.

The alteration is popular with competitors. “I hit a 4-iron into the 5th hole today and it pitched on top of the bunker and came back in,” McIlroy said, adding that he expected to find his ball against the face. “I didn’t know at this point that they’d made that little gradual rise up into the face, and when I got up there, I was pleasantly surprised that I had a shot. I wouldn’t say there’s one person in the field that wouldn’t welcome that change.”

Still, it’s tempting to wonder what a 68-year-old retiree in Japan thinks of it.

Tommy Nakajima was in contention at the 107th Open at St. Andrews in 1978 when he reached the green of the par-4 17th hole in regulation. His birdie putt caught the wrong side of a contour and fell into the infamous Road Hole bunker, a much more cavernous pit of despair then than it is today. He needed four shots to extricate himself and eventually made a nine. “The Sands of Nakajima” entered Open lore.

Nakajima didn’t bemoan the severity of the bunker or the slope that carried him to his doom. Nor did the R&A soften things for the next day’s play. He got there with the combination of a marginal shot and lousy luck, and the same is true of most shots that find the hazards at Hoylake. It’s not the function of the R&A to cushion marginal shots or mitigate bad breaks. Or it didn’t used to be. Luck cannot be legislated out of links golf. If anything, it’s the soul of the ancient game.

The PGA Tour is proud of the courses it presents every week in its feverish but futile effort to commodify conditions and eliminate unpredictability from the game. Most Tour members are grateful for that since it reduces things to a test of execution and lessens the demand for intangibles, like imagination, creativity and forbearance. The Tour will deny that is the philosophy governing its course set-up, but it’s the result.

Trying to minimize unpredictability is entirely at odds with the essence of links golf. And at the Open, fickleness encompasses everything — the weather, the bounce, the lie, even the water pressure in British showers, which in bygone years could be likened to being peed on without the warmth. Reducing the potential for cruel outcomes in bunkers diminishes the very character of the ground game.

Changes to course set-ups because of tepid player reviews are nothing new. Jack Nicklaus introduced rakes that gently furrowed bunkers at Muirfield Village in the 2006 Memorial Tournament, intent on presenting a greater challenge. Locker room griping led to the experiment being abandoned. At the 2017 U.S. Open at Erin Hills, the USGA dispatched lawnmowers to remove high fescue rough after complaints, despite the fairways being wider than Tiananmen Square.

The oldest battlefront in golf is where the desire to present a challenge meets the players’ determination to not to be embarrassed. Major championships should seek to advance that front in favor of the challenge while being careful to remain on the right side of goofy. Softening bunkers at Royal Liverpool is counter to that goal.

The R&A should simply have directed complainants to Rahm’s comment earlier this week when asked if the new 17th hole is too harsh.

“I would say if it is it’s fair, because it’s unfair to everybody,” he replied. “Like it’s golf, and it’s life. Simple as that.”

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Watch: Protesters attempt to disrupt British Open with minimal success

As Slumbers predicted, the environmental group “Just Stop Oil” attempted to make a mark at Royal Liverpool.

Prior to the start of play at the 151st Open Championship, R&A CEO Martin Slumbers admitted that activists had targeted last year’s tournament and although the threat was snuffed out, he conceded the same might happen this year.

“We have significant security procedures in place. We work clearly with the law enforcement agencies, and we’ll wait and see what happens,” Slumbers said. “You will have seen that we advised the players, please don’t get involved, and I stand by that. We have enough things in place to be able to deal with it.”

As Slumbers predicted, members associated with the environmental group “Just Stop Oil” attempted to make a mark on the activity at Royal Liverpool on Friday during the second round, although the group had little success.

“Just Stop Oil” organizers are pleading with the British government to stop licensing all new oil, gas and coal projects. The group has made appearances at cricket, tennis and horse racing events.

According to the coach, who asked to remain anonymous, a man was standing by a television camera structure behind the second green when he reached into his backpack and pulled on a bright orange baseball cap. The color orange is closely associated with a group that has disrupted numerous high-profile events in Britain this summer.

The witness said the man was immediately wrestled to the ground by a nearby police officer and other security officials quickly moved in. A photo taken by the coach shows a man pinned to the ground by an officer while a pair of security team members assist.

Golfweek asked the R&A to comment on the incident and was referred to a statement issued Thursday by Merseyside Police, which said a man had been escorted from Royal Liverpool after he entered the Open without a ticket. ”Officers were made aware of the incident and a male was identified but tried to run away. He was detained under the Section 1 pace order and escorted off the grounds,” the statement said.

“So you rugby tackle people to search them for a ticket?” the coach who witnessed the event told Golfweek. “He didn’t look to be running anywhere to me. No way they tackle you for a ticket violation.”

The color orange is closely associated with Just Stop Oil, a British environmental group that has used orange paint and powder in direct action protests to draw attention to the climate crisis in an effort to force the U.K. government to move away from fossil fuels. The group has targeted high-profile sports events, including disruptions to two matches at Wimbledon earlier this month. An incident at the Open has been widely anticipated.

And Billy Horschel walked a protester off after an orange flare was fired in the air on the 17th green. Horschel was playing with Alex Noren and Corey Conners.

The R&A released a statement that indicated four arrests were made.

“Play was not disrupted and we would like to thank marshals, players and other spectators for their vigilance and understanding as the protesters were removed,” the statement read.

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At Wimbledon two weeks ago, two protesters were arrested after running onto one of the courts and disrupting a match by throwing orange confetti.

 

See Brian Harman’s golf equipment at The Open

A complete list of the golf equipment Brian Harman is playing this week at Royal Liverpool Golf Club during the 151st British Open

Here is a complete list of the golf equipment Brian Harman is playing this week at Royal Liverpool Golf Club during the 151st British Open:

DRIVER: Titleist TSi2 (9 degrees), with Graphite Design Tour AD IZ 5 S shaft

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FAIRWAY WOOD: Titleist TS2 (13.5 degrees), with Fujikura Speeder 661 Evolution 2 S shaft

IRONS: Titleist U•500 (3-5), with Project X HZRDUS Smoke Black 90HY 6.0 shafts, Titleist 620 CB (6-PW), with True Temper Dynamic Gold S300 shafts

WEDGES: Titleist Vokey Design SM9 (50, 54, 60 degrees), with True Temper Dynamic Gold S400 shafts

[afflinkbutton text=”Shop Brian Harman’s wedges” link=”https://globalgolf.pxf.io/OrY17z”]

PUTTER: TaylorMade Daddy Long Legs

BALL: Titleist Pro V1

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Bunkergate? Sand at 2023 British Open raked differently over night

Much had been made about how grounds crews had flattened the bunkers in advance of the tournament.

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HOYLAKE, England — Players voiced their displeasure with the Royal Liverpool bunkers at the 151st British Open on Thursday and the R&A has responded by making an adjustment for Friday’s second round.

Championship organizers changed the way the bunkers were raked overnight.

“Yesterday afternoon the bunkers dried out more than we have seen in recent weeks and that led to more balls running straight up against the face than we would normally expect,” the R&A said in a statement released on Friday morning. “We have therefore raked all of the bunkers differently to take the sand up one revet on the face of the bunkers. We routinely rake bunkers flat at most Open venues but decided this adjustment was appropriate in light of the drier conditions which arose yesterday. We will continue to monitor this closely for the remained of the Championship.”

Much had been made about how grounds crews had flattened the bunkers in advance of the tournament, a move that didn’t allow wayward shots to settle comfortably in the middle. The result had been an array of difficult lies for players, some in fairway bunkers and others while cozying up to the greens.

World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler discussed on Wednesday how penal the bunkers can be, how they made him nervous and how unusual he found them to be in comparison to what he experienced in 2021 at Royal St. George’s in England.

“I feel like at St. George’s a lot of the bunkers had a tiny bit of an upslope before you got to the wall face, and here it seems like the faces of every bunker is almost a downslope going towards it,” he said. “I don’t think that’s something I particularly like in a golf course. I think it doesn’t reward the good shots as much. If you’re closer to the green you end up closer to the lip, and if you get a worse shot and barely get into the bunker you actually have a play.

“So I would prefer if there was a little bit of slope there, but that’s what’s so special about the majors. Every golf course is different and it’s a challenge, and I’m just going to do my best to stay out of them this week.”

Added Rory McIlroy after the first round: “When you hit it into these bunkers you’re sort of riding your luck at that point and hoping it’s not up against one of those revetted faces.”

But thanks to the adjustment made by the R&A, McIlroy said he had a better chance to make

“I hit a 4-iron into the 5th hole today, and it pitched on top of the bunker and came back in, and I thought it was going to be — like I didn’t know at this point (about the change) that they’d made that little gradual rise up into the face, and when I got up there, I was pleasantly surprised that I had a shot,” McIlroy said. “Yeah, I wouldn’t say there’s one person in the field that wouldn’t welcome that change.”

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Wyndham Clark hits fan’s iPad at British Open, forced to hack out of thick fescue

Clark took a major hack out of some thick fescue only to see the ball go about two feet.

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There’s nothing like the British Open, and there’s nothing like true links golf.

“There’s some great American links courses, but it’s not the same,” said Jordan Spieth after his first round of the 2023 Open Championship. “You don’t have the fescue grass, and that’s what makes it.”

If you were watching U.S. Open champ Wyndham Clark on the 14th hole during Thursday’s first round of the Open Championship, you saw a major champion taking a major hack out of some of that thick fescue.

Choking up on his club, Clark swung about as hard as humanly possible, only to see his ball pop up, advance about two feet and then disappear again.

From there, his third shot landed greenside, and then he got up-and-down to save bogey on the par-4 hole, his lone bogey of the day in which he shot a 3-under 68 to put himself in contention.

“That was huge. A little unfortunate off the tee, obviously hitting the guy is never good, but it really went into a bad spot. If I didn’t hit the guy, probably would have been in fine grass and I would have been able to hit it up near the green,” Clark said. “Then I had an awful lie and hit it about two feet. Then got very fortunate I didn’t go in the bunker.”

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Wait, his ball hit a fan?

“Yeah, it hit his iPad, didn’t hit him,” Clark clarified. He was then asked if the iPad was ok. “Well, I don’t care now. It screwed me up.”

Clearly not enough to throw him off his round. He birdied the next hole, parred Nos. 16 and 17 and then closed with a birdie. The pair of 4s on the two par 5s down the stretch was huge, but escaping real trouble on 14 was perhaps even bigger.

“Getting up-and-down and making about a 20-footer really is a round saver.”

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Christo Lamprecht ‘the Lamp Post’ leads the way with 66 at 2023 British Open

Everyone in the field is looking up at the 6-foot-8 South African in more ways than one.

HOYLAKE, England — Christo Lamprecht stopped in the 18th fairway at Royal Liverpool Golf Club on Thursday and took a mental photograph of his name on the famed yellow leaderboard at the 151st British Open.

Everyone in the field was looking up at the 6-foot-8 South African, who is believed to be the tallest player ever to compete in golf’s oldest championship, but not for the usual reason. Lamprecht, a 22-year-old ranked third in the World Amateur Golf Ranking and playing collegiately at Georgia Tech, carded seven birdies and shot an opening-round 5-under 66 to grab a share of the lead with Englishman Tommy Fleetwood and Argentina’s Emiliano Grillo. Lamprecht, who is the first amateur to hold the lead or co-lead after any round on the PGA Tour since Paul Dunne in the third round at the 2015 Open Championship, smiled after the round as he described how the view from the top of the leaderboard suited him just fine.

“It’s nice to see a lot of work behind the scenes pay off,” he said. “It’s something I haven’t dreamt of yet, but it’s pretty cool.”

Open Championship 2023: Leaderboard, tee times, hole-by-hole

Lamprecht is hard to miss, and as he surged to the top of the leaderboard, his height became a topic of conversation in the gallery. Lamprecht is as lean as a 1-iron and as light as a lamp post, which might make for a good nickname (Lamprecht the Lamp Post or simply the Lamp Post has a good ring to it.)

He only sports a size 13 shoe, but he can certainly send it off the tee, noting that his stock driver carries 320-325 yards. Still, he can bust it 340 yards in the air if need be.

“But I don’t want to. Not in this weather. Not in links golf,” he said. “It rolls far enough, so I kind of keep it in front of me.”

Color long-bombing Bryson DeChambeau impressed. He stopped to take a look at Lamprecht’s action.

“He just wished he had my length, I guess,” Lamprecht cracked.

Don’t we all. Stewart Cink, the 2009 Open champion and a Georgia Tech alum, has hit balls next to Lamprecht on several occasions at the school’s practice facility in Atlanta and offered this assessment:

“As a 50-year-old golfer seeing a guy like him, he is pretty much like your basic nightmare, watching a guy like him coming up,” Cink said. “He’s got a lot of really good potential in front of him.”

At 6-foot-4, Lamprecht’s father, an accountant by trade, is shortest of the past five generations. His great grandpa measured an even 7 feet. Lamprecht played on South Africa’s junior national team but gave it up to pursue golf early in high school. That’s also about the time he went through a growth spurt.

“Everything golf-wise was everywhere,” he said. “I didn’t know what was going on. I was changing clubs every six months.”

Almost as surprising as his gangly build is his lack of a South African accent.

“Apparently I’m a full-blown American now, which I don’t like,” he said. “Yeah, it’s bad. I don’t know why it’s changed. I can’t change it back. I don’t know what’s happening.”

As a junior golfer in South Africa, Lamprecht participated in Louis Oosthuizen’s golf academy for four years. After Lamprecht became the youngest winner of the South African Amateur in 2017, he said, “I hope Louis is really proud of me.”

Lamprecht earned a berth in the British Open field last month by winning the British Amateur, and got paired with Oosthuizen, the 2010 Open champion, for the first two rounds. He called Oosthuizen, who is nearly a foot shorter than him, “someone I’ve looked up to.”

“It was kind of a nice draw,” he said. “I thought they rigged it by some means, but no, I loved it.”

Yet Lamprecht said he still experienced a case of nerves at the first tee. On Wednesday afternoon, he had a lousy range session. Then he had another poor session before his first round and snap-hooked his drive at the first. That’s when his caddie, his assistant coach at Georgia Tech, Devin Stanton, told him, “Listen, you’re playing The Open as an amateur; no need to stress.”

From there, the birdies started falling, including three in a four-hole stretch on the front nine and a chip-in from about 40 yards at the difficult 14th hole.

“That was a big steal,” he said.

Oosthuizen, who shot, 74, was asked if Lamprecht had ever beaten him before when they played.

“Never by eight strokes,” Oosthuizen said.

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