British Open Off To Wild Start
From one end of the golf spectrum to the other, Thursday’s first round of the 124th British Open provided something for everyone.
It ranged from the sublime story line to the frightful spectacle, from Tom Watson, Ben Crenshaw, John Daly and Mark McNulty all going around the Old Course in 67 strokes to Jack Nicklaus taking a 10 on one hole. There have been wilder rounds in the Open’s 124-year history, but not many. Watson, 45, Crenshaw, 43, McNulty, 41, and Daly, 29, form an unusual quartet at 5 under par.
Three old guys and a good old boy on the Old Course? Why not? The ball takes funny bounces over here, something to which Nicklaus will attest later.
First things first. The furious day began on a crazy note. Watson hooked his opening tee shot almost into the 18th fairway, hooked his second shot with a 7-iron just over the Swilcan Burn and 70 feet from the hole, and then slam-dunked the putt for birdie.
“Pretty nice start,” Watson dead-panned. It foreshadowed a pretty nice finish, though. Watson went on to shoot his lowest first round in 21 Open appearances, birdieing five holes and eagling one.
All of a sudden, here we go again. The sky is gray, the wind is up, the golf is on the links and Watson is tied for the lead at the British Open.
“I played some pretty good golf coming in,” he said. “I love links golf and playing the kind of shots that it demands.”
Some people get sand in their shoes. Watson gets sod - old sod. The five-time British Open champion hasn’t won a golf tournament since 1987 and he hasn’t won a major championship since the 1983 Open. But he is again in contention here, just as he was last year, when he made the leaderboard in all four majors.
Watson is striking the ball purely, putting it pretty well on the slower greens and might be able to avoid the one bad round that knocked him out of contention in each of last year’s Grand Slam events.
How he holds up is still to be determined, but in the meantime, there are plenty of other possibilities. Crenshaw, the historian and Masters champion, would be a perfect fit at the Old Course.
Daly figures he can drive the green at six of the par-4 holes, did it on one (the 316-yard 12th) and will try to arm-wrestle the place into submission.
Lurking a stroke behind at 68 are Vijay Singh, Bill Glasson, Mats Hallberg and David Feherty, the native of Northern Ireland who has struggled since coming to the United States to play the PGA Tour full time.
Of all the things that happened at the haunted old links Thursday, it is a tossup as to whether the quintuple bogey by Nicklaus or the topped drive by Ian Baker-Finch was the more embarrassing.
Certainly, Nicklaus’ was the more opprobrious, given his history and stature. It happened at the 14th hole, the 567-yard par-5 that is called simply “Long” and statistically is the hardest par 5 in championship golf.
Nicklaus hit a good drive over the Beardies and had a 3-wood in his hands. He had 200 yards to carry Hell Bunker, the deep, dark trap that sits 83 yards from the green. He hit what he thought was a good shot, and thought he would find his ball 30 yards in front of the bunker.
As he walked past it, he heard his son, who was caddying for him. “There’s a ball in the bunker,” Steve Nicklaus said.
“Bunker, hell,” his father replied. “That’s Hell.”
And it was. Nicklaus left his first shot in the bunker. Outraged, he tossed his club out and told Steve to give him his sand wedge. He thrashed at the ball again. And again.
Finally, on the fourth attempt, he was out. He tossed his club again, pitched his ball 35 feet from the hole in seven strokes.
“To add insult to injury,” he said, having missed a 5-footer for nine, “I then three-putted.”
And when he added them all up, it was 78 strokes, one more than Baker-Finch, who won this title in 1991 and has disappeared since.
Arnold Palmer, who was hoping to play well in his final British Open, struggled to an 83, the highest round of the day.
Nick Faldo shot a 74 and has a long road back. Tiger Woods’ 74 was the highest round shot by any of the five amateurs in the field.
xxxx Leaderboard Leaders after the first round of the 124th British Open on the 6,933-yard, par-72 Old Course at St. Andrews: John Daly 34-33-67 Tom Watson 36-31-67 Mark McNulty 33-34-67 Ben Crenshaw 33-34-67 Mats Hallberg 36-32-68 Bill Gleason 34-34-68 Vijay Singh 33-35-68 David Feherty 34-34-68