CLEAN SHEET
Bogey-free Snedeker leads British Open going into weekend.
First off, Brandt Snedeker would like to clear up any misconceptions about his desire to emulate his idol, five-time British Open champion Tom Watson.
“He’s one of the great ballstrikers of all-time,” Snedeker said Friday.
“I am not, by any stretch of the imagination.”
Maybe, but he has fooled Royal Lytham & St. Annes so far. Through two rounds of the 140th Open Championship, on a tight links course with 206 bunkers and punishing rough, the 31-year-old from Nashville not only has not made a bogey — the first player since Tiger Woods in 2000 to get through the first 36 holes in a major without one — he hasn’t been in a bunker, or in the really evil rough.
“My misses have been really bad misses, but fortunately they’ve been in the gallery, so they’ve been okay,” he said. “They’ve all been on the correct side of the fairway, though.
“You’re not going to be able to hit every fairway, you’re going to have to hit it in the rough and get fortunate sometimes, and I have. And I don’t feel guilty about it at all.”
What he and Watson have in common, though, is what has Snedeker at 10-under par after 36 holes — an Open record at Lytham — after Friday’s 64.
“I think we both hole a lot of putts. Tom in his prime holed a lot of 25- and 30-footers, and when I’m playing I tend to do that a lot, too,” Snedeker said.
“I’m making every 25-footer I look at, so that makes it a lot easier. The reason I knew I was going to play well this week is because from the first day I stepped on these greens I had a great feel for the pace.”
Through two rounds in nearly ideal scoring conditions — soft, nearly windless, with manageable green speeds — Snedeker has had just 47 putts.
It’s no sure thing that kind of form on the greens is going to continue, but Snedeker, who has Oshawa’s Scott Vail as a caddy, is not overly worried about his ability to handle the heat that is certain to come on the weekend.
Though most people may only remember his tearful press conference after losing the Masters to Trevor Immelman in 2008, Snedeker is a three-time winner on the PGA Tour and, more importantly, he said, drawing a big laugh, “I’ve lost a lot since then, gotten used to it.”
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When he holed a lengthy putt at the 18th to save par, Snedeker held a five-shot lead over Paul Lawrie and first-round pace-setter Adam Scott, but he knew that would change by day’s end. Scott, in fact, followed his opening 64 with a 67 to climb within a shot of the lead.
The two of them have put some distance between themselves and their nearest pursuer, Tiger Woods — who made birdie at the 18th out of a typical, vertical-faced greenside bunker to get to 6under, four off the lead — but “that can be one hole out here,” Snedeker said. “If it’s blowing sideways tomorrow, no lead is safe.
“So I’ll keep trying to make as many [birdies] as possible. There’s no need to back up now.” It’s a thought. Woods, who shot a second consecutive 67, has now opened with two rounds in the 60s eight times in majors, and he has won all seven of the previous ones. He said the bunker shot on 18 wasn’t as hard as it looked, and basically downplayed everything about his round, but admitted he was looking forward to the weekend and some tougher weather, though he wasn’t necessarily buying the 30-mile-per-hour winds forecast for Sunday.
“Well, they haven’t got the forecast right yet, so we’ ll see,” he said.
“It’s a world-class leaderboard stacked up a few shots back,” Scott said, “so I think no matter what the conditions are tomorrow, one of those guys is going to have a good day and make up ground.
“So we certainly have our work cut out, Brandt and myself, to stay ahead of that pack.”
The pack includes the fellow paired with Woods, Denmark’s little-known Thorbjorn Oleson, who birdied the 17th and 18th for 66 to finish at 5-under, and a group at 4under headed by 1999 Open winner Paul Lawrie, Graeme McDowell, Matt Kuchar, Jason Dufner and South African Thomas Aiken.
Snedeker has played what he calls boring golf.
“If you’re putting it good like I have been for the last couple of weeks, you feel you can play pretty well if you can just drive it in play,” he said, “and I’m shooting away from every pin, trying to put it 25, 30 feet away. Even if I had a sand wedge in my hand, [I] just to make sure I don’t put myself in a bad spot.”
“He’s one of the best in the world with the flat stick,” said Mark Calcavecchia, who shot 68 to make the cut at 1-under.
“Brandt is a momentumtype guy. Once he gets it going and starts making putts, he plays quick and he’s got the quick tempo and he putts quick and they go in quick. That’s awesome golf, 10under-par.”
A practice round with Watson at Royal Birkdale three years ago, Snedeker said, taught him a lot about links golf, things he had only begun to learn at the 2001 British Amateur on perhaps the quirkiest links course of them all, Prestwick in Scotland.
“You kind of have to embrace it for what it is. This is where golf started. This is the way traditional golf was meant to be played,” he said. “Me and a couple of buddies made a big two-week trip out of it and played everywhere all over Scotland. I recommend anyone coming over here for about 10 days. We had a blast.”
His worship of Watson — who made the cut on the number Friday at age 62 by holing a 30-footer for birdie at the 18th — may have something to do with the love affair with links.
“I love the way [Watson] swung it,” Snedeker said. “He has such a classic golf swing. No holdback in it whatsoever, just got out there and ripped it every time. He lived in Kansas City his whole career, pretty much, lived in a cold weather spot, didn’t go south and find good weather, kind of played in bad conditions all the time.”
Snedeker’s own bad conditions have had much to do with injuries. He cracked a rib a couple of months ago while coughing, and had to miss the U.S. Open, and only returned two weeks ago at The Greenbrier, where he shot 67 in the final round and finally felt 100% again.
He is only halfway to the Claret Jug, though, and he knows it.
“It was pretty cool to see your name atop a major leaderboard at any time, let alone at a British Open,” he said. “It’s a great feeling, but it gets you a whole lot of nothing. Anybody who’s watched our tour this year, there’s been a lot of leads lost after 36 holes, and I’m going to try to buck that trend this weekend.”