Royal Troon’s changing winds brought carnage to the British Open

TROON, Scotland – The most dangerous place to be on this Thursday in Scotland is the Open Championship lead.

Maybe you’re Younghan Song, the 33-year-old South Korean birdieing four of the first eight holes only to hit your 11th tee shot into the evil, dense gorse bush. Only to hit into another native area from there. Only to drop and hit it into more thick shrubbery. Triple bogey.

Maybe you’re Matt Wallace, the Englishman who hit a majestic shot to the pin at Royal Troon’s infamous eighth hole to get to 4 under par. He then made his way to No. 9 and took five shots to get even near the green. Triple bogey.

Maybe you’re Justin Thomas, about to become the story of the day. The two-time major winner who’s historically struggled with links golf birdied Nos. 7, 8 and 10 to take a two-shot lead at 4 under. But then, you guessed it, his drive on No. 12 went wide left, into Troon’s vibrant ecosystem, and forced an unplayable lie. Double bogey. Followed by another bogey.

Thomas at least birdied 17 and 18 on the way in to have the best round of the morning – a 3-under 68.

Thomas is in third place, three shots behind Daniel Brown and two behind Shane Lowry.

The 152nd Open Championship at Royal Troon is confounding the best golfers in the world.

It is cold, windy and wet, but also flat-out confusing. The wind is changing from one day to the next. Swirls off the Firth of Clyde are inconsistent. Putts are ending a full foot short, leaving golfers in shock.

This bewilderment leads to frustration. This frustration leads to impatience. Suddenly, one bad break becomes an ensuing bad decision and a bad hole turns into a bad round. Links golf is already the greatest mental challenge in the sport. Thursday took it up a notch.

Defending U.S. Open champ Bryson DeChambeau – the guy who’s gone sixth, second and first in this year’s majors – was already 3 over going into the longest par 5 in Open history at No. 6. The angst was building, and then he topped his second shot from the deep rough so badly it went only 4 yards. So in some mix of anger and impatience, DeChambeau again tried to hit a wood out of the rough and hit an ugly line drive so far left it went into the 13th fairway. By the end of the round, the top two players at that Pinehurst U.S. Open – DeChambeau and Rory McIlroy – were a combined 11 over.

The main character of the day, though, was that wind change.

“Tuesday: different wind. Wednesday: different wind. Today: a different wind,” said Alex Noren, among the contenders after a 2-under first round.

The prevailing wind at Royal Troon is a strong one off your back on the first six holes. The course essentially flips at 7-8-9, before playing the more difficult back nine into the wind. But on Thursday, the first six holes went into the wind – meaning holes like that 620-yard No. 6 are playing even longer – while the back nine played shorter.

But that doesn’t necessarily make it easier, because they hadn’t practiced any of these holes this way. It’s a different course, on the first day they’re keeping score.

“Really, I was picking clubs for the first time off every tee today,” Adam Scott said. “I hit very different clubs than I did in any practice rounds.”

On the ninth hole, two-time major winner Jon Rahm hit an approach comfortably from the fairway that immediately led to him muttering, “No way.”

“Gimme another one,” Rahm said. “That’s in the bushes. How is that possible with a hurricane up there?” It was not, in fact, in the bushes, but Rahm hit a provisional; it was far from the first or last taken by a competitor on Thursday in expectation of the worst possible outcome.

Nicolai Højgaard, a rising 23-year-old Danish talent, had a share of the lead at 2 under on his back nine, but on the par-3 14th hole the wind took his tee shot and tossed it off the back of the green and into the wall of the grandstand. Højgaard bogeyed before eventually finishing the day one back.

“You’ve got to stay focused and committed to whatever you’re doing,” he said, “especially when it’s windy. You’ve got all those damn bunkers there that’s going to swallow some balls, and it’s like, you’ve just got to stay present out there.”

And these conditions affected the fans, as well, and in turn those fans sometimes affected the players right back. As Justin Rose teed off at No. 8, rain crashed down on umbrellas. Wind thrusts around the grandstand, one gust taking an umbrella, landing it on the ground and making a loud noise during Rose’s backswing. The Englishman, in turn, put his ball in the brutal right-side bunker.

“The wind, I think a lot of guys had game plans to just send driver the first few holes and to pitch up there today,” said Scotsman Bob Macintyre, who was quite happy with his 1-over 71. “When it’s straight back into the wind it kind of switches you back into fighting, and it’s difficult. I’m hoping it doesn’t die off later on.”

It is links golf at its finest. Risk and reward. Birdies and bogeys. Not just boring, uncreative par golf. You have to adjust and make choices, and every single hole provides excellent upside and horrific consequences from bunkers to wildlife to tricky greens.

That’s why it would be a tragic mistake to just label this as weather-related difficulty. No, Royal Troon was built to play in this weather, and it’s Royal Troon that is punishing these golfers.

Like the Postage Stamp No. 8, where McIlroy hit a nice-looking shot just to the right edge of the green, seemingly putting for birdie. But slowly, the ball kept moving off the slope and rolled around the edge and into the drain-like right side bunker. On his first bunker shot, he hit another great-looking shot that sat up on the same edge of the green. It rolled down that same drain. Double bogey.

On his triple bogey on No. 9, Wallace said he could have hit a 3-wood instead of a 2-iron off the tee, and he went for a hold fade that just slightly missed off the turf. It spun up and went into the gorse

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Yes, the wind flip might have added intrigue to Thursday, but the actual conditions aren’t even near their limit. More rain is coming. The wind will increase. The first round was a brutal, stimulating day of golf, yeah, but Scott didn’t want anyone feeling sorry for them.

“It’s going to play as easy as it can all week.”