Given the job I do, “You must be really good at golf” and “You must play golf a lot” are two things I’m often told, but they couldn’t be further from the truth.
Unfortunately, writing weekly about the best players in the world has not transferred over to my own game, which is disappointing to put it mildly and harsh to be honest!
A handicap of 36 shows the level we are working towards, occasionally we feel we are making rapid progress but then we are looking for lost balls and stray shots.
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After winning the British Open, Xander Schauffele spoke to Sky Sports about some of his key shots during the final round at Royal Troon.
Driving too far off the tee, having a bad short game and inconsistent putting are not the winning formula on any course, let alone Royal Troon, one of the toughest courses in the British Open that is challenging almost everywhere.
Before you hear more about the round, I’ll give you a few “excuses” – teeing off at 6:50am, no warm-up, using rental clubs, and not getting enough sleep after a long week, it wasn’t the best preparation, although you’d be nervous on the tee regardless.
A few unconventional practice swings did make the driver on the first tee worried about whether I would be able to hit the ball, but thankfully the first shot of the morning was just in the air and landed on the left side of the fairway.
Two rough iron shots and an ineffective pitch not far from the green left me 30 feet from the pin, two-putting for double bogey, better than Justin Thomas’ first shot in the final the day before.
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Justin Thomas had triple bogey on the first hole at Royal Troon, his worst start to his final round at the British Open.
As I reflected on the struggles some of the world's top players encountered at Royal Troon this week, I took some solace when things didn't go as planned, starting with a tee shot from the top of the next hole that buried its ball in the thick rough ahead.
What the TV didn't show was how difficult it was to find the ball in the rough around the iconic course, with shots being lost at an alarming rate on the front nine. The big numbers were quickly added up and the hopes or dreams of breaking 100 were quickly dashed.
My game rarely compares to Rory McIlroy’s, although making a snowman of a par-4 5—as he did when he missed the cut in the second round—is as good as it gets.
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Rory McIlroy’s hopes of making the cut began to fade when he shot eight on four par-5 holes at the Open Championship at Royal Troon.
The fifth, a par 3, was a mixed bag, with one of the best shots of the day coming from the rough to the green followed by a three-putt, while the following par 5 was a struggle for anyone who could hit the ball as far off the tee as the best players in the world with a short iron.
Somehow, all the fairway bunkers on the par-4 seventh were avoided, although by then they were already thinking about the next hole – the iconic “Stamp” – and what kind of damage that would cause.
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Some of the biggest misses are on the eighth hole at Royal Troon Golf Links, nicknamed the “Postage Stamp” hole because of its small green.
It's only when you're on the tee box that you really get a feel for how small the green is and all the challenges that surround it. The breeze and empty stands are daunting enough, so I shudder to imagine what it will be like during a tournament.
The tee shot was remarkably good for a shot that wasn't on the green, not hitting the Coffin bunker, not hitting the sand on the other side of the green, and not hitting the thick rough that Romain Langasque found himself in before his swift exit from the tournament earlier in the week.
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Oliver Fisher explains how to play the legendary Postage Stamp at the Royal Troon.
A nice chip shot gave us a good chance of an unlikely par on one of golf’s most iconic par 3s, though in the end it ended in a tight bogey putt after pushing the initial downhill attempt past a few feet.
A bogey on a postage stamp?! The hole where major champions had double and triple bogeys during the tournament? The hole where Joaquin Niemann shot an eight in the second round? As you can imagine, the joy on my face was palpable.
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Joaquin Niemann encountered three different bunkers on the Postage Stamp hole at Royal Troon, resulting in a quintuple-bogey eighth on the par-3.
Reality quickly set in on the next hole, when my tee shot disappeared into the rough just 100 yards out, and for someone like me who has a poor tee shot, the tee shot from the 10th hole couldn't even reach the fairway.
Avoiding the rails was the only advantage on the 11th, known as one of the toughest par 4s in major golf, but I made quadruple bogey along the way, and a good start on the 12th was quickly ruined when a lopsided iron shot ended up buried in a gorse bush.
Another high number on the 13th hole had me questioning why I even tried to play the sport, although motivation returned when I found a greenside bunker on the 14th tee shot and made bogey after almost getting up.
The good score gave me some confidence going into the final stage, and my longest shot of the day came on the par-4 15th hole, where I then hit a good hybrid that put me only about 50 yards from the flag.
An ambitious plan to hit the ball onto the green and roll it onto the green turned out so nearly flawlessly that the ball kept moving in the direction of the hole before sliding painfully off the green. My teammates looked on in disbelief as I tapped in my first shot of the day.
The good feeling continued, and I made a nice bogey on the par-5 16th, even though I hit it left of the tee box toward the hospitality stands, but on the 17th, I let frustration take over.
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The Open crowd cheered when Kim Si-won hit a spectacular hole-in-one on the 17th hole at Royal Troon.
After my tee shot landed in a deep bunker, I spent the next few minutes hitting a series of shots that would go viral on social media and consign any sporting blunder to history.
After failing narrowly on my first attempt and hitting the ball straight into a bunker on my second, my numerous failed attempts to reach the green left me furious and one of my golfing buddies crying with laughter.
“Great putt on 11” should never be a comment on a hole, but after finally getting the ball behind the green and two-putting from far away on the eighth try, it became a reality. Patience and some real ability come in handy at that point.
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Watch Justin Rose's quest for the Claret Jug in the final at Royal Troon Golf Club.
Despite the chaos that preceded it, the 18th felt special after another decent tee shot, ending with a bogey to end a round that had some good signs but also a lot of shockers!
Golf is hard. Royal Troon is hard, too. It may be at least 50 shots worse than what Xander Schauffele shot on the final day of his most recent major victory, but Scottish courses are among the gems of our sport and it’s a true privilege to play.
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