Players wait out a St. Andrews storm

ST. ANDREWS, Scotland — Fortune smiled on the early-morning British Open groups Friday when play was suspended for three-plus hours after torrential rains flooded the course. Two groups teed off before the R&A halted play.

“It was like D-day,” said South Africa’s Thomas Aiken, who was in the second group off. “When we got out on the range, it was like, ‘Are you serious? Are we really going out in this?’ Yeah, I mean, we hit a tee shot (on the range) and we couldn’t even putt on the putting green. The putting green flooded by the time we had got to the first tee.”

The first group was on the green awaiting a ruling, and Aiken thought his group was going to be called off before it teed off.

“They waited for all three of us to hit and then called us back in the clubhouse,” he said. “It wasn’t the most ideal start, but I’m happy that we got a break because the weather was atrocious.”

When play was suspended for the evening, 42 players were still left on the golf course. Play was expected to resume at 2 a.m. Eastern Daylight Time, and the forecast called for heavy rain.

Padraig Harrington was on the range when the storm unleashed its fury. He was sure he was going to have to tee off.

“This is The Open Championship. Considering the weather we played in in 2002 at Muirfield, we were going to go play,” he said. “But unfortunately the town of St. Andrews drained onto the first fairway, so they really couldn’t go. We were happy about that. I snuck into one of the Tour vans and slept for an hour and a half or so.”

Despite the conditions, Zach Johnson added a 1-under-par 71 Friday to his opening 66.

“My mind-set was let’s hope there’s a delay. But I thought that mind-set was pretty far-fetched, considering it is The Open Championship, and you expect brutal conditions at times. You expect the first tee, here you go, here’s your peg, here’s your ball, whatever is presented, go play. Clearly they made the right decision.”

When the players did tee off, the conditions had turned favorably.

“Not only did we not have to play in the storm this morning, but when we played nine we played it straight downwind every hole, and then the wind changed a little when we came around that turn there, so the back nine we didn’t end up playing it into the wind, we just played it in a cross wind,” Harrington explained.