Rory ready to kick up a storm at Oakmont
After all the horror stories in the build-up to the 116th United States Open, rory McIlroy may well find his prayers have been answered and he wakes up to a rather different Oakmont this morning.
One of those thunderstorms that feel like they’ve been handed down from the bible was predicted for last evening, with showers continuing into today’s opening round.
On tuesday, with the course playing fast and fearsome, the Northern Irishman had predicted he would have to be disciplined enough to spend most of his time playing to specific spots on the severely sloping greens and forget about the flags. Now, he might well find himself back in his wheelhouse of taking dead aim.
With warm weather moving in thereafter and making for a hot and steamy weekend, this is shaping up to be one of those events where you try to make some gains over the first half of the event and hold on for dear life in the second.
Let’s hope it happens, for then we would have the ultimate examination.
And so after all the unbridled excitement leading up to the first major of the season at Augusta National we arrive at the second where McIlroy summed up the mood in a single word: trepidation.
every player begins in the knowledge that a missed fairway will almost certainly lead to a bogey, as will a missed green in regulation.
Here, the greens have all the treachery of Augusta’s with one significant, added complication.
Whereas at the Masters the players are chipping from tight lies and can employ all their skill and wizardry to recover, here the putting surfaces are protected by ferocious rough that takes all the control out of a player’s hands.
‘every shot you play, you’re under pressure,’ said McIlroy.
the test is so extreme you wonder if we’re going to be left with one of those US Opens where it proves too difficult and you get a lucky winner, like Webb Simpson at the Olympic Club in 2012. Yet Oakmont’s rich history and its distinguished cast of champions precludes such thoughts.
Going back in order through the mists of time we find Angel Cabrera, ernie els, Larry Nelson, Johnny Miller, Jack Nicklaus and Ben Hogan as the last six Oakmont winners. Note, there’s not a single one major wonder among them.
It’s only right, therefore, that world No 1 Jason Day starts as favourite to add further lustre to the list. It was over the lunar landscape of last year’s venue at Chambers Bay that we started changing our opinion about the then under-achieving Aussie, who had all the skills but struggled so often to finish the job.
He didn’t win that week in Seattle but showed a core of steel in battling to the end against the debilitating effects of an awful attack of vertigo. A month later, he went close again at the Open at St Andrews before achieving his breakthrough at the USPGA Championship. Since then, a regular dialogue with tiger Woods on how to win has led to a tiger-like run of six victories in his last 18 starts. Day says he’s feeling the stress like never before in trying to keep the run going but it isn’t showing. this is the major he feels suits his game more than any other and it will be interesting to see if this proves to be his time.
As for McIlroy, does he now have the maturity to win on courses where — for at least half the tournament anyway — he will have to rein in all his attacking instincts? the other question is whether he can hole enough of the eight-footers he will inevitably face on these greens.
No such problems are likely for defending champion Jordan Spieth in that department, of course, but too many of them will be for bogeys unless he starts hitting the ball straight from the tee. He’s got no chance of keeping hold of the trophy if he can’t hold the fairways.
then there’s the unknown quantity, Justin rose. It’s hard to imagine a more perfect set-up for his consistent game than this one but how is he going to fare after a month off with a flared disc in his back? Will it be a case of beware the injured golfer or will he be out of here come tomorrow?
A quiet fancy? How about the lone Scot russell Knox, who has the game and temperament to do well on such a test. the top two in 2007 were the top two in greens hit in regulation, and that’s his game to a tee.
All week the town of Pittsburgh has been in feelgood mode after its team won ice hockey’s greatest prize, the Stanley Cup last Sunday.
Now the attention switches to the great outdoors, and a US Open that promises so much.