For golf fans, it really is a case of waiting for the best till last. We have loved the magic of The Masters at Augusta, we have gone through the challenge of the US PGA, we have enjoyed the brutality of the US Open, but now it is time for the greatest Championship of all – The Open. The last Major of the season, but the one we love the most.
And in the summer of sport, it arrives perfectly. The Euros and Wimbledon may have ended and the Olympics in Paris are only just around the corner, but The Open slots right in between. So read on as AMERICAN GOLF sets the scene for the 152nd staging of this wonderful golfing event.
The Open history:
History and golf go hand-in-hand. It’s one of the reasons why we all love this sport, playing a game that still has the same principles and foundations as all those years ago. And it all comes together in the third week of July every year for The Open Championship.
We must go all the way back to 1860 for the first one, when a group of eight professionals gathered at Prestwick Golf Club. A man called Allan Robertson, the former pro at St Andrews, had long been considered the best golfer around until his death in 1859. That meant a tournament needed to be staged to discover who was the ‘Champion Golfer’ to succeed him. These eight men played three loops of the 12 holes at Prestwick, with Willie Park Sr from East Lothian in Scotland crowned the winner after 36 holes. Park was the first Champion Golfer of the Year, a title that is still bequeathed to the winner of The Open 164 years later.
The Claret Jug:
For such a prestigious and storied tournament, it is only fitting that the winner receives one of the most famous trophies in all of sport – the Claret Jug.
The trophy came into being for the first time in 1873 when a new one was needed with Young Tom Morris getting to keep the original Challenge Belt, having won the tournament three times in a row. Three clubs – Prestwick, St Andrews and Muirfield – donated £10 each for the creation of a trophy befitting the growing status of The Open and the Claret Jug was created.
Now each year, the winner’s name is engraved on the trophy before being presented in a ceremony around the 18th green and in front of the massed grandstands and The Open’s famous yellow leaderboard at the conclusion of the event on Sunday evening. The Champion Golfer of the Year gets to keep it for a year before returning it to The R&A at the start of the week of the following year’s Open. But for those 12 months, the golfer can take the Claret Jug wherever he likes and can fill it with whatever drink he chooses!
The Open loves to be beside the sea:
The Open does not have one single venue that it uses, but rather a collection of courses that are used on a rota. 14 different courses have staged the event, with the Old Course at St Andrews holding the most with 30, most recently the 150th Open in 2022. St Andrews is of course the Home of Golf and the home of The Royal and Ancient Golf Club, the organisers of The Open.
The first stipulation for The Open is that it must be played on a seaside links course. The courses are situated are on a special type of land called linksland, ie it links the land and the sea. It is traditionally sandy, coastal terrain which has been sculpted over thousands of years by the wind buffeting in off the sea. It has hard ground and harsh grasses and was traditionally unsuitable for growing crops as it was too exposed to the weather. This type of land is common across the coastlines of the United Kingdom and Ireland. It is the type of land around St Andrews Bay where the Old Course sprang up and it is the idea of playing the same type of golf as the game’s forefathers did all those years ago.
There are currently ten venues on The Open rota – five in Scotland (St Andrews, Carnoustie, Muirfield, Royal Troon, Turnberry), four in England (Royal St George’s, Royal Birkdale, Royal Liverpool, Royal Lytham & St Annes) and one in Northern Ireland (Royal Portrush). However, The Open has never been played in Wales. With up to 250,000 spectators expected across a week and a huge infrastructure required, it is a colossal effort to stage an Open. A golf course needs to be of a required standard of difficulty yet it must also be able to welcome all those visitors to the area in terms of accessibility in and around the golf course. That brings with it a certain amount of inconvenience and because of this, apart from St Andrews which hosts The Open every five years, it is more often eight or nine years between use of a particular venue.
This year’s Open venue:
For the tenth time and 101 years since it first welcomed the Championship, Royal Troon will host this year’s Open. Situated on the Irish Sea in Ayrshire on Scotland’s west coast, a little over 30 miles south west of Glasgow, Royal Troon offers a traditional links test.
It is a classic ‘out and in’ course, as in the front nine holes head out from the clubhouse and the back nine comes back towards it. There is also a very different approach required. The prevailing wind direction at Troon usually means the front nine plays downwind meaning birdie chances aplenty. Turn back for home and the wind direction switches with a series of daunting par-fours into the wind ready to challenge the players. It’s a case of running hot early on and holding on coming home. The course this year measures 7,385 yards with a par of 71, but don’t be surprised to see scorecards like out in 30 and back in 40, such is the discrepancy between the two nines.
The long and the short of it:
This year’s Open will feature the longest hole on The Open rota and the shortest. The 6th at Royal Troon, ‘Turnberry’, is so named because the other Open venue south along the Ayrshire coast can be seen in the distance on a sunny day. But at 623 yards, it will be the longest hole ever featured in the 152 stagings of this event. Par-fives are usually where pros look to make their scores, but this will be far from a gimme birdie with a long second shot required to a narrow green. To make a birdie or scramble a par may require all of the star players’ renowned short game skills.
However, the real signature hole at Royal Troon is the iconic ‘Postage Stamp’. The par-three eighth hole measures ‘only’ 123 yards, but it still offers plenty of terrors. Normally, it should be little more than a gap wedge for the players – a doddle, right? But with the usual crosswind and a tiny ‘postage stamp’ green surrounded by pot bunkers, a par three is always welcome on the scorecard. Organisers will find little nooks and crannies to put the flags on different days, but players should never be tempted to chase the flag. Find the middle of the green every day, take your two putts and move on.
To further add to the excitement, The R&A have floated the idea of moving the tees forward on one of the days, so the hole plays just 99 yards. That is basically a hole from a pitch-and-putt course, so there will be a secret joy at watching pros struggle to make par on a hole measuring less than 100 yards in length!
Stars and stripes rule the roost:
With Glasgow (Prestwick) Airport within earshot of Royal Troon, players can plan a hasty getaway back home. Perhaps that’s what makes Americans so comfortable at this venue, where they have enjoyed enviable success. From nine Opens played here, Stars and Stripes golfers have walked off with the Claret Jug on six occasions, from 1962 to 2004. Legends Arnold Palmer and Tom Watson head that list, which was only ended by Henrik Stenson’s brilliance in 2016. The Swede produced an Open record of 20-under, 264, to eventually beat Phil Mickelson by three strokes after one of the finest tussles in Open history given the standard of golf both men produced. Has Stenson broken the spell or will American hegemony be restored by Sunday evening?
The weather:
Now we Brits love talking about the weather, don’t we? We can’t help it, it’s just ingrained in our blood. And we can’t talk about The Open without mentioning the weather, either. Why? Because it plays such an intrinsic part in the tournament.
Seaside links courses are meant to be experienced across all kinds of weather. On a benign sunny day, links courses can be tamed as the ball runs miles on hard, sandy fairways and pros can shoot very low scores. But the following day, everything can change. The clouds come in, the wind picks up, the rain starts to fall and the golf course bares its teeth. Bunkers that seemed like only in use for decorative purposes become hazards. The yardage book becomes irrelevant and players have to use their imagination to hit the right shots on the right holes. A hole that can require a drive and a wedge one day may suddenly need a drive and a long iron the next and even then that may be no guarantee of reaching the green. Four sunny days and a winning score could be 20-under as it was for Henrik Stenson (2016) and Cameron Smith (2022). Four tough days and a score of three-over can be good enough as Padraig Harrington showed in 2008 at Royal Birkdale. That earned him a four-shot victory over the rest of the field!
There is also the mercy of the draw. Given that players tee off on the first two days between 6.30am in the morning and 4pm in the afternoon, seaside weather can vary hugely over a span of almost ten hours. It can be flat calm early on before the breeze picks up later in the day, or vice versa. A player’s hopes of winning The Open can be over before the weekend simply because of the luck of the draw and the vagaries of the British climate.
Five British Open legends:
Peter Thomson:
This son of Melbourne, Australia must be included in the list of any Open legends, for the sheer magnitude of five wins, including three consecutive ones from 1954 to 1956. He then added further successes in 1958 and 1965 to cement the reputation as one of the finest links players of all time.
Tom Watson:
Growing up in Kansas City, Missouri, Tom Watson was probably as far from the sea as it is possible to get in America. And when this golfer first encountered seaside golf, he openly admitted that he hated it. But from there, he would become the greatest American in Open history. Between 1975 and 1983, he lifted the Claret Jug five times, including the 1977 ‘Duel in the Sun’ with Jack Nicklaus at Turnberry, widely regarded as the greatest battle in the tournament’s long history. Arguably, it should have been six. At Turnberry in 2009 at the grand old age of 59, Watson only needed to par the last to win a post-war record sixth Open. Sadly, one of the greatest sports stories ever did not have the miracle finish. Watson bogeyed and subsequently lost to fellow American Stewart Cink in a play-off.
Seve Ballesteros:
For golf fans of a certain age, Severiano Ballesteros changed the game’s landscape. He first made an impression when he was runner-up in 1976 aged just 19. Here was a kid from Spain with jet black hair and a glint in his eye, who had magic in his hands. To conquer links golf, you need imagination, flair, a little bit of luck and a sense of occasion. Luckily, Seve had all of these in bucketloads. He would lift the Claret Jug three times, in 1979, 1984 and 1988. While his celebration in 1984 at St Andrews from holing what turned out to be the winning putt on the final green is arguably the most famous in the Championship’s history.
Sir Nick Faldo:
While we know it as The Open, in theory and for many years (especially in America), it was called the British Open. And no Briton tamed the challenges of seaside golf quite like England’s Sir Nick Faldo. Between 1987 and 1992, he won three Claret Jugs as he established a reputation as the game’s iron man. To win his first Open in 1987, Faldo produced a final round of 18 pars. When the weather was fair at St Andrews three years later, he finished in a then record 18-under. And two years later at Muirfield, he was the last man standing with the rock-solid technique and even stronger temperament befitting of a Champion Golfer.
Tiger Woods:
Remarkably Tiger Woods has ONLY won three Opens and none since 2006. That does not matter. In that period between 2000 and 2006 when he collected his three Claret Jugs, Woods seemed invincible, while he inspired hundreds to take up this great game. Injuries have since taken their toll on his battered body, but the legend remains as strong as ever. To witness peak Woods at that time was to witness as close to perfection in golf as many of us have ever seen. Even at 48 and with little chance of competing at Royal Troon, he will still command huge galleries with fans hoping for a glimpse of what he once had every single time he teed up.
Silver medal:
Now the Champion Golfer of the Year receives the Gold medal while the Silver medal goes not to the runner-up, but to the leading amateur in the tournament. Amateurs play an important role in The Open with a number granted automatic exemptions, while others battle through Local and Final Qualifying to take their place among the greats in the 156-man field.
To win the Silver Medal, the amateur must make the cut and play all four rounds. For some, it is the first step on the road to greatness, for others it will turn out to be the week of their golfing lives.
Only two players have won the Gold and Silver Medal at The Open – Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy, so illustrious company indeed. Other famous Silver Medal winners include 2022 US Open winner Matt Fitzpatrick (2013) and Justin Rose when he finished tied fourth in 1998 as a tender 17-year-old. Rose produced one of the most famous finishes in Open history when he chipped in for a par on the 72nd hole to rapturous applause, and he is still going strong in professional golf some 26 years later.
Future Open venues:
British Open 2025: Royal Portrush (Northern Ireland)
British Open 2026: Royal Birkdale (Southport)