The Open Championship – Memories and 2011 Tips
The US Masters is all about picture perfect settings and subtlety in the way it punishes golfers for errant shots with sleight of hand rather than brute force. The US Open brings harsh and highly visible penalties to the fore. The Open Championship (or British Open) is a different beast again, with each of the seaside links courses that form the Open rota being at the mercy of the elements more so than the other majors. Creativity, imagination and a little luck are all at a premium here.
This year the Royal St George's Golf Club hosts the Open Championship for the 14th time since 1894, when it became the first club outside Scotland to host the championship. Located in Sandwich, Kent, the course features a significant number of holes with blind or partially blind shots, though the number of such shots has been reduced over time. Royal St George's also features the deepest bunker in championship golf, located on its fourth hole.
The course has seen some tinkering in between championships with respect to par – it played as a par-72 when Bobby Locke won in 1949, a par-70 for the victories of Bill Rogers (1981), Sandy Lyle (1985) and Greg Norman (1993) and most recently a par-71 when the previously unheralded American golfer Ben Curtis took home The Claret Jug. This year the par will revert to 70, with the fourth hole, formerly 497-yard par-5, now becoming a 495-yard par-4. Given the aforementioned monstrous fairway bunker presence, any player who can navigate this hole in even par over the four days will be in good stead.
As with other venues for the Open Championship, weather plays a significant role in the scoring for the week. 2-over par was sufficient for Sandy Lyle in 1985, while 1-under par got the job done for Ben Curtis eight years ago. However, the 1993 version featured more benign weather and good scoring, as well as one the great final round duels between the best players in the world at the time.
Nick Faldo arrived at Royal St George's that year as the defending Open champion and with a total of five majors to his name at the time. He took the lead of the tournament on Friday with a sterling round of 63 and was joint leader with Corey Pavin at 8-under par headed into the final day.
Bernhard Langer had claimed his second Green Jacket at Augusta in April of 1993 and was looking to make good on a number of near misses in the Open Championship, including one at this course in 1985. He had been one stroke off the pace after 36 holes and retained this status after 54 holes, going out in the second-to-last Sunday pairing at 7-under par.
Greg Norman remained mired on just the one major championship victory (the 1986 Open Championship at Turnberry) entering the week, albeit that a number of heartbreaking defeats and continued success in tours around the world saw him retain a spot among the upper echelons of the world golf rankings. He posted rounds of 66-68-69 to join Langer in the second-to-last Sunday group at 7-under.
A quick look at the Saturday evening leader board would suggest that the Great White Shark was in with a great shot at a second title…. right up until remembering that Faldo had bested him each time at the majors when both had been in the hunt for a championship. The most famous example (prior to 1993) was at St Andrews in 1990 – paired together on the Saturday when duelling for the lead, Faldo shot a 67 to Norman’s 76 and cruised home to a five-stroke victory on the Sunday. Of course, an even more painful meeting for Norman was to take place at Augusta in April 1996, but in 1993 Faldo as the tournament leader was the hunted and Norman and Langer were the hunters.
Norman started fast on the Sunday with a string of high quality drives and precision iron shots. Not to be outdone, Faldo made another solid, methodical start. He was not going to let anyone slip past him the easy way – to take the title from him would require a supreme display of golf. But Norman was playing in an inspired fashion and by midway through the round had assumed the tournament lead.
Langer was the first to feel the pressure. Feeling like he needed to press with five holes to go, he pushed an errant driver out of bounds on the 14th hole. He finished valiantly, posting a final round 67 and a 10-under total of 270 for the weekend, but his charge effectively ended on the 14th tee.
Faldo continued to put together a vintage Nick Faldo final round – one solid shot after another, maintaining the pressure on Norman to the very death with a final round 67 to finish at 11-under. It was a gallant defence of his title and one that in many a different circumstance would have yielded a fourth Claret Jug.
However on this Sunday, the Shark would not be denied. In a round that the great Gene Sarazen described afterwards as ‘awesome’ and Langer described as the best round he’d ever seen, Norman played precision golf right through to the 17th hole, where he missed a putt of just over a foot in length. There would be no further mistakes on the final hole, as he finished off a vintage round of 64 to complete the tournament at 13-under and seal a two-stroke victory.
Afterwards, Norman said: “In my whole career I’d never before gone round a golf course and not miss-hit a single shot. I was playing a game of chess out there, hitting the ball into position in the fairway where I could get it to the best spot on the green. I didn’t want the round to end. I wished it could have been 36 holes.” Of the short missed putt at the 17th, he said “I must have got careless… but the mistake did me a world of good because it made me determined to make sure on the last hole.”
This tournament was another high point in the history of Australian golf and a resurgence in the form of Norman, who went on to lose yet another heartbreaker at the subsequent major, the 1993 USPGA Championship, in a playoff to Paul Azinger.
While this Open Championship victory would also be his final major title (as the pattern of near misses would rear its head again in subsequent years), it may have also proved to be the pinnacle of Norman’s career – two extremely worthy adversaries played well on the final day and he simply blew them out of the water. And on that positive note, it’s time to turn to predictions for this week.
2011 British Open selection
To recap, similar principles to those which apply for “Sting’s racing selections” will be in place here – bets will only be recommended for a top-5 finish in the tournament of that week where the price offered is $6 or better, with odds offered by our new partner Luxbet being used in the analysis. To sign up and receive a free bet worth $100, simply click on the link below.
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Results for June 23 selections
Bubba Watson (The Travelers Championship): T-38
Year to date selection results: 19 selections (excluding refunds), one winning collect, return of 6.00, Profit on Turnover (POT) = -68%
As noted above, the Open Championship is at the mercy of the elements more so than the other majors – a morning tee time on the Friday at St Andrews last year proved pivotal for winner Louis Oosthuizen, while an afternoon tee time that day proved fatal to the hopes of Rory McIlroy.
With such luck in mind, I cannot take the short odds about any of McIlroy, Donald or Weswtood, worthy though they are of the top three spots in betting. Instead, my cash will be carried by world number 10-ranked golfer Nick Watney.
He took last week off after a two-stroke victory at the AT&T National, a tournament where he blazed through the final 27 holes in 12-under par – no question marks on his recent form. This victory was his second for the year and his eighth top-10 finish in just 14 starts on the USPGA Tour in 2011.
He tied for seventh at St Andrews last year and importantly put in two quite respectable performances (27th in 2009 and 35th in 2007) at his two prior starts at the event, results which belied his much lower world rankings at the time. The man clearly has an aptitude for links style golf.
His USPGA Tour statistics for 2011 also suggest a man with the all-round game to claim a major – he ranks 17th on the US Tour in driving distance, 14th in greens-in-regulation, fifth in stokes gained putting and tied for tenth in bogey avoidance. At odds of $8.00 for a top-5 finish, I think he makes a good value bet.
