Thomas has absent Tiger ‘in my ear’ with advice on his Open bid
Tiger Woods may not be at the 149th Open in person but at least one of the leading Claret Jug contenders is expecting the three-time winner to give him lots of advice over the next four days.
“It’s obviously a bummer not having him out here,” said world No 3 Justin Thomas of Woods continuing to recover from the serious leg injuries sustained in a car crash in Los Angeles in February.
“But we talk quite a bit and I’m sure he’ll be in my ear all this week. He doesn’t sleep a whole lot, so he’ll probably be watching the golf. Many times I’ll hit a bad shot or miss a short putt and he’s the first person I get something from. He keeps me humble and I think that’s why we have the friendship that we do.”
Woods was gearing up for his Masters title defence when he suffered his injuries in a single-vehicle accident in California, with the 15-time major winnerhavingofferednoindication about when he will be back on a golf course again.
“He’s unfortunately been through that [out injured] more than others,” added Thomas, the 2017 US PGA champion.“buti’vesaidtohim many times that ‘I’m ready for you to start doing stuff again because you’re annoying the hell out of me (smiling)’.”
Like Woods, Thomas loves links golf, hence why he’s started to play in the Scottish Open as part of his preparation for golf’s oldest major. “I don’t remember exactly what year it was,” he said in reply to being asked to recall his first memed
ory of watching The Open. “But, being the golf nut that I was, even when I was seven or eight years old I would watch the ESPN coverage for eight or nine hours in a row.”
Thomas, who is making his fifth appearance in The Open, having tied for 11th at Portrush two years ago, enjoyed getting his hands on the Claret Jug on a flight home with Jordan Spieth after his success at Birkdale in 2017.
“I have held it,” he said, “but
I wouldn’t have unless Jordan told me he drank out of it when Zach [Johnson, the 2015 champion] won and then won it the next year. So I’m like, ‘give me that thing’.”
If the definition of insanity really is doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results, then Louis Oosthuizen is happy to be considered mad.
Already a runner-up in all four major championships, Oosthuizen took his unwant
total of near misses to six by finishing second in both the US PGA Championship and the US Open this season.
But given that it took a historic performance by Phil Mickelson to deny him in the US PGA and a birdie-birdie finish from Jon Rahm in the US Open, the 38-year-old South African is not about to make drastic changes to his approach as he seeks a second Open title.
"If it was a case where I completely collapsed the last four
or five holes or something like that, it would be something I would look into a lot more," said Oosthuizen, who lifted the Claret Jug at St Andrews in 2010 and lost a play-off at the same venue five years later.
"But in those two cases I don't think that was the case. I played really well. If I can put myself in that position again and just try and aim better, I would be that insane person and try and do the same thing.”