No easy answers at Carnoustie
to get a good feel for what I’m going to do, and then adjust accordingly.”
Others are coming to a different conclusion. Because while the links are as fast as ever, the rough is too thin, too wispy to wreak havoc. Dustin Johnson, the No. 1 player in the world, figures he’ll hit driver about half the time on the 15 holes that are not par 3s. Twotime U.S. Open champion Brooks Koepka also is bullish on the big stick, saying the driver will come out on about eight or nine holes.
Defending champion Jordan Spieth was considering his options on the final day of practice. On the 415-yard fourth hole, with a bunker on the right side of a dogleg left and another bunker farther out on the left side, he hit a fade over the right bunker. The other option is a long iron that splits the bunker.
And then Spieth had another idea.
“Aim for the 4?” he asked his caddie, Michael Greller. He then motioned to the gallery about 60 yards off the tee to scoot back a bit, and Spieth blasted a shot over their heads toward a yellow patch of rough that separates the right side of the fourth green from the 15th tee. There’s not enough deep grass to get into trouble.
The answers will start arriving on today when the 147th edition of the British Open — and the eighth edition at Carnoustie — gets started.
“I think there’s not going to be one player in this field that has a game plan on Wednesday night and is going to stick to that game plan the whole way around for 72 holes,” Rory McIlroy said. “It’s just not going to happen with wind conditions, with pins. You start to feel a little bit more comfortable with a few shots, and you might start to take some on.
“Because the golf course is playing so firm and fast there’s some guys that will see it completely different than the way I see it, and vice versa,” he said. “It’s going to be really interesting to see how it all plays out.”
Sandy Lyle of Scotland, who won the Open in 1985, gets it started with the opening tee shot this morning. Spieth, who will try to become the fifth player in the last 50 years to win back-toback in the British Open, plays in the morning side of the draw.
Among those playing in the afternoon are Woods, back at the Open for the first time since 2015, and Koepka, who will try to become the first player since Woods in that momentous summer of 2000 to win golf’s two oldest championships.
Carnoustie is regarded as the toughest of the links in any conditions, though it rarely sees this kind of yellow-and-brown conditions. The ball still rolls on brittle ground into the wind. Put the breeze at their backs, and some holes will have no more than a wedge into the greens.