By DOUG FERGUSON AP Golf Writer
TROON, Scotland — Justin Thomas made his British Open debut at Royal Troon eight years ago, and it taught him everything he needs to know about what can make this major so maddening.
It had nothing to do with gorse bushes or pot bunkers. It was about weather and tee times.
“I was in the bad one,” Thomas said.
By that he meant the bad side of the draw, and it’s part of the charm – or curse – of the event.
It was fairly benign in the opening round at Royal Troon in 2016, all the way through Friday morning until 30 mph winds and a driving rain made players in the afternoon feel they were on a different course than those who played early.
So severe was the change in weather that the leading 14 players going into the weekend, including Henrik Stenson and Phil Mickelson, came from one side of the draw.
“I’ve never in my life grinded so hard to finish 50th,” Thomas said. “I shot 77 and made the cut by one. The worst part was Saturday and Sunday. The morning was the worst and you couldn’t gain any ground.”
Summer daylight hours in the U.K. enable players to start off one tee for the entire day. Justin Leonard will hit the opening tee shot on Thursday at 6:30 a.m. local time (Wednesday, 10:30 p.m. PT). Sam Horsfield is the last to play. He will tee off about 4:30 p.m. (8:30 a.m. PT).
That allows the weather to play a massive role. That happens elsewhere, but it is more pronounced in links golf. Sometimes the worst of it is in the morning, as in 2008 when Rich Beem and Sandy Lyle walked off Royal Birkdale after nine and 10 holes, respectively.
The forecast for the start of the 152nd Open is for off-and-on rain during the day with gusts in the 20 mph range early in the afternoon – about the time Rory McIlroy and Jon Rahm are finishing their rounds – and then easing late. And then more gusts Friday afternoon.
It’s worth noting the forecast seems to change by the day. No one will really know until they’re in the clear, or feeling like they are being blown into the Irish sea.
In recent times, Louis Oosthuizen caught the good side of the draw in St. Andrews. It was relatively calm all of Thursday – McIlroy opened with a 63 in 2010 – and then the wind became so fierce in the afternoon that McIlroy shot 80.
Oosthuizen finished his 65-67 start right before the wind came through. His name stayed atop the leaderboard for 11 hours that day and he led by five when it was over and wound up winning by seven shots. Good golf and a good draw go a long way.
“It’s part and parcel of the Open. There’s always good draws and bad draws,” Tommy Fleetwood said. “Generally, if you get unlucky and there is a good side and a bad side, that’s wiping out half the field already. The good news is if you’re on the good side. That’s half of them gone and you only have to beat half the field.
“But that’s always been part of the Open and that’s the beauty of it,” he said. “You have to be ready for whatever the conditions bring, along with the golf course. It’s very important to embrace what can happen.”
Another memorable example was Saturday at Muirfield in 2002. Tiger Woods had won the Masters and U.S. Open that year, raising possibilities of a calendar Grand Slam. He was two off the lead going into the third round when a storm off the Firth of Forth brought rain and 40 mph gusts. Woods shot 81 – nine others were in the 80s – and there went the Grand Slam.
Even getting the bad end of the draw is not the end of the British Open. Padraig Harrington should serve as inspiration to everyone for what he did in 2008 at Royal Birkdale. He was caught in the raging wind Thursday morning and scrapped his way to a 74. Harrington went on to win by four shots for his second straight British Open title.
But it can be maddening. Gary Woodland recalls one British Open when he was staying with Dustin Johnson. They compared notes at the end of the round.
“I was early, he was late,” Woodland said. “I’m hitting 3-iron into holes where he was hitting sand wedge. You just hope you’re on the right side. Otherwise, you try to make the most of it. Half the field is getting (dumped) on. I grew up in the wind. I like the tough conditions. But you’d like to be on the good side.”
Conditions can be even more exaggerated at Royal Troon by its out-and-back nature. The forecast for one of the practice rounds this week was an example of the worst that can happen, with wind in the players’ faces going out, and then it shifted, so they had to play the back nine into the wind, too.
The last time the Open was at Royal Troon, it had the second-worse draw bias – one side far better than the other – in Open history. It was so bad that Friday afternoon that the cut line dropped three shots in a span of 45 minutes.
Such is the nature of this fickle championship.
“Everybody knows that going into the Open,” Thomas said. “But I am so ready for a six- or seven-shot draw and being on the good side. It’s going to be awesome whenever it happens.”
The British Open raised its purse by $500,000 to $17 million, which R&A chief Martin Slumbers attributed more to inflation than trying to keep pace with the other majors. He offered no apologies for that on Wednesday.
The other three majors have higher purses. The PGA Tour has 11 tournaments with a higher purse, while LIV Golf has 13 individual tournaments at $20 million each.
That puts the British Open at No. 28 among prize funds in golf.
“A, I didn’t know 28. And B, I don’t care,” Slumbers said in his final British Open press conference before he retires. “That’s not what this is about.”
Slumbers has been outspoken about the rising purses in golf and whether it’s a sustainable model. The CEO says the R&A has a greater role than running championships,
He said golf was “riding on the crest of a wave” with increased participation in the last several years, citing figures of 62.3 million people playing golf in the countries the R&A oversees, which is all of them except the United States and Mexico.
“These are very encouraging figures, but we have to maintain this momentum,” Slumbers said. “To do that, we must have a sustainable business model in the long term. If you look at golf as a pyramid, however strong the pyramid is at the top, it can only be sustained in the long term if the pyramid is equally strong at the base.
“We see that as our responsibility, and that is why we invest all of the proceeds from The Open back into the sport.”
He said the goal was to make sure the recreational game is thriving and the best young players have a path to get to the elite level “so the professional game of tomorrow flourishes.”
“While we will always offer a very competitive prize fund for The Open, our wider focus is on increasing participation and improving pathways in golf,” he said. “We have to make choices about how we allocate resources and make the resources we have go as far as they can.”
English amateur Dominic Clemons sees his debut British Open like a horse race.
“I’ll see where I’m at halfway and then hopefully I can make a move at the weekend, if I’m to make the cut,” he said Wednesday after a practice round on the front nine at Royal Troon.
The 22-year-old Clemons, who is transferring to Alabama after a year at Stetson University in Florida, was one of the final qualifiers. He and Justin Rose shared the top spot in the 36-hole qualifying tournament at Burnham and Berrow Golf Club in southwest England two weeks ago.
When asked what success looks like this weekend, Clemons doesn’t hesitate: Finish first.
“I’ve got a lot of self-belief. I don’t see there’s any reason to put a limit on myself,” he said.
Time will tell if he can keep up with the thoroughbreds.
“It feels good just to compete against the best. It’s my first major. You never quite know, do you, where your game is at,” he said. “So this will be a good week to see where it’s at. And as I said, it’s golf at the end of the day, anything can happen.”
Clemons will have his dad on the bag when he tees off Thursday morning with 2009 Open champion Stewart Cink and Chris Kirk.
Tommy Fleetwood doesn’t have any explanation for no British winners of the British Open since Paul Lawrie at Carnoustie in 1999.
Fleetwood in 2019, Justin Rose in 2018 and Lee Westwood in 2010 all have been runner-up, without a serious chance of winning. Rory McIlroy and Darren Clarke from Northern Ireland have won the claret jug.
“We’ve had a lot of good players, and it just doesn’t seem to happen,” Fleetwood said. “Who knows if one breaks through and then there comes a flood of British winners. I think you look at tournaments that didn’t quite go the way of some British players in the past. I think there’s definitely guys that have done enough and it just didn’t happen.
“It’s just one of those strange runs, I feel like, that hopefully finishes sooner rather than later.”
Fleetwood also pointed out it’s just one tournament a year and it’s not easy. Danny Willett of England won the Masters in 2016 and Matt Fitzpatrick of England won the U.S. Open in 2022. Then again, the last British-born winner of the PGA Championship was Tommy Armour in 1930.
Muirfield has the reputation of being the purest links on the British Open. It has hosted the Open 16 times dating to 1892 and has never gone more than 11 years between Opens except for gaps brought on by two World Wars.
But it last hosted the British Open in 2013, and the next opening is not until 2027.
Muirfield was threatened to go off the rotation until it voted to accept female members. And then it hosted a Women’s British Open. There’s also the issue of the Scottish Open finding a home at The Renaissance Club, which is next door to Muirfield.
It would be tough for a tiny East Lothian town to have two championships in consecutive weeks.
“Absolutely, we’re going back to Muirfield. It’s a brilliant golf course,” R&A CEO Martin Slumbers said. “I’ll have a little conversation with Mr. Kinnings about maybe moving the Scottish Open from the Renaissance.”
He was referring to Guy Kinnings, the new CEO of the European tour.
Slumbers also said Portmarnock in Ireland remains in the mix for its first British Open. The R&A has only taken the event to Northern Ireland at Royal Portrush.
He said Portmarnock has asked the Irish government for support of a business plan, “and we are fully supportive of the club doing that.”
AP Sports Writer Ken Maguire contributed.
