BlogThe Open Championship Preview and Picks

The Buzz about the Open Championship:

Feel like I am in San Diego.  The weather has been perfect, it’s hard to believe that it’s going to be in the mid-80s over the weekend.  The course is already dry, brown and fast so if they could get some afternoon winds look for a great Open Championship.

A little bit about the history of Muirfield:

The Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers is called Muirfield by all.  It is one of the more stricter private clubs that is found in golf, with many restrictions for those privileged enough to play it.  One perfect example, four-ball matches are forbidden so if four of you show up for a game expect to play alternate shots.

Other than that I find Muirfield to be the best, yes I said the best course that I have ever seen.  It has a wonderful mix of holes, with the front side playing clockwise with the back nine playing counter-clockwise inside of the front nine.  This is one of the keys to Muirfield, both nines finish at the clubhouse which is very rare for a links course in Britian.  With the routing of the nines you only find one stretch, holes 3, 4 and 5 in which hole consecutively go in one direction which makes the course very fair in drastic wind conditions.  The holes that do have bends in them have an equally number not to favor faders or hookers.  Also of the 18 holes only one hole, 11, has a blind tee shot which is another thing that makes it great.  All shots to the greens can be seen from the fairway of tees of the par 3s so in some peoples minds Muirfield is the fairest test of golf.

The course has 146 bunkers spread around it and all of them are located in fair places, not hidden away like many links course have.  Muirfield is also one of those rare link courses that you can play through the air, like you find on a course in America.  You can play a run-up shot but through the air is more the ticket.

Another thing that makes Muirfield special is the overall design hasn’t changed in over 80 years and other than added length its the same course that Walter Hagen won the British Open on in 1929.  While the big news of the majors in America is adding length with par 4s just a notch under 500 yards, you won’t find that at Muirfield.  The longest par 4 is the 14th hole at 475 and there are only three other holes, the 18th at 470 yards, the sixth at 461 yards and the tenth at 469 yards that are over 450 yards.  You won’t find many Major Championship venues that only have four holes over 450 yards.  On the reverse side four holes, two, three, eleven and twelve are under 400 yards, another thing you won’t find.

Muirfield has been used a lot by the Royal and Ancient, holding 15 British Opens and ten British Amateur Championships.  It also held two Walker Cup and Curtis Cup matches and is still the only Scottish course to hold the Ryder Cup, playing host to the matches in 1973.

Here are some of the secrets of what it takes to play well at the British Open:

Key stat for the winner:

A marquee winner, thats been the norm. Of the 13 different Open champions in the 15 different Muirfield Opens, 12 of the 13 winners are in the World Hall of Fame.  The only one not in is 1935 champion Alf Perry.  No other venue can boast a higher percentage of Hall of Fame members and only one has as many.  (Of the 28 Opens at St. Andrews, of the 23 different champions only 12 of the winners are Hall of fame members, so it ties Murifield but has had almost twice as many championships played). Taking this a step further, of the 13 different Open champions at Muirfield they have won a total of 82 major championships.  If you look at the top-18 major winners of all time, 8 of them have won at Muirfield.

If you look at those that were runner-up at Muirfield, that also is a list of major championship winners.  Of the 18 different runner-ups, ten of them are winners of major championships: John Ball, J.H. Taylor (twice), Harry Vardon (twice), Johnny Farrell, Alf Padgham, Fred Daly, Jack Nicklaus, Lee Trevino, Paul Azinger and Steve Elkington.

So the list of those at the top at Muirfield is nothing short of stellar.

Here are some more key stats to look to for this week:

• Player that drives the ball the straightest.  Muirfield may not have the narrowest fairways but does have the toughest rough to get out of especially if you venture too far off the fairway.
• Need for patience.  This is one of those British Open courses that par is your friend, so don’t look for low scoring.
• Scrambler.  Green are a bit small and a player must have the skills to get it up and down from either long grass or greenside bunkers.
• Be able to play in all conditions.  Just like any course on the British Open rota, Muifield is right next to the North Sea and weather conditions won’t be the same for all four days.  So a player will have to be able to play under dry, sunny conditions along with windy conditions and have the patience to play in any conditions.
• Player that hits lots of greens.  Not only is hitting fairways important but the winner will be the player that hits the most greens.  The horrors of Muirfield await those just off the greens so its always best to get the ball on the green in regulation.
• Putting.  Its always a key to any championship, especially those putts from the four to ten foot range.  Since the greens aren’t that large it will be important to make those 15 to 20 footers for birdies, greens are pretty flat.
• Now what does all of this mean?  Another win for Tiger Woods as he is best suited for Muirfield