Rickie Fowler joins a host of other top names, Major winners and history-makers at the British Open Championship this week. We add up the figures, facts and stats for one of golf’s most prestigious tournaments.
12...
It’s a dozen years since a Brit last won the Open, or ‘British Open’ as the rest of the world calls it (especially the bit on the other side of the North Atlantic). But this year, three men have a distinct chance. Northern Ireland’s Rory McIlroy, who recently showed stunning class to win the US Open, tees off with Red Bull favourite Rickie Fowler and 2002 champion Ernie Els at 9.09am BST on Thursday.England’s Luke Donald underlined his own superb recent form with a near-perfect win to retain his world number one status at last weekend’s Scottish Open at Castle Stuart. Meanwhile, after finishing T3 last year, world number two Lee Westwood is keen to be the first Brit to win since Paul Lawrie in 1999 at Carnoustie – incidentally, that was the infamous year Jean Van De Velde took a paddle in the burn on his way to a final-hole triple bogey that blew his championship hopes.
Rory McIlroy (© zzazazz/Flickr)
7,211...
Royal St George’s, on the English coast at Sandwich in Kent, is known as one of the toughest courses in golf, and 2011 is the 10th time it has hosted the Open, the previous years being 1922, ’28, ’34, ’38, ’49, ’81, ’85, ’93 and 2003. With a par of 70, its holes total a distance of 7,211 yards of undulating fairways and tricky greens. If players on the front nine can successfully negotiate the sand dunes and the 50ft deep bunker on hole four, they then run the gauntlet of holes 14, 15 and 16, with the 496-yard par-four 15th seen as especially challenging.
15...
There are no fewer than 15 Open champions in the field for this year’s event at Sandwich. They are, in alphabetical order: Mark Calcavecchia, Stewart Cink, Ben Curtis, John Daly, David Duval, Ernie Els, Todd Hamilton, Padraig Harrington, Paul Lawrie, Tom Lehman, Justin Leonard, Sandy Lyle, Mark O’Meara, Louis Oosthuizen and Tom Watson. Watson, then 59 years of age, just missed out on a sixth Open title two years ago in a play-off with Stewart Cink, having topped the leaderboard – his five Open triumphs came in a golden period between 1975 and 1983. Sandy Lyle won a full 26 years ago – well over three years before the aforementioned McIlroy and Fowler were even born – and tees off at lunchtime on day one, back at St George’s, the scene of his 1985 triumph.
17...
He won’t even be here for the 2011 Open, but spare a thought for Tiger Woods. Still world number one as recently as last October, a 20-month winless streak and knee and ankle injuries which have forced him to take time out have left the biggest name in golf at number 17 in the world rankings, his lowest ebb for 14 years. His three Open victories in 2000, 2005 and ’06, each time when he ended the year in question as the world number one, must seem an awfully long time ago.
Sandy Lyle (l) and Seve Ballesteros (r) at the 2006 Open (© Peter/Flickr)
1979...
Another former champion who will be sadly absent, for very different reasons, is Severiano Ballesteros. Seve, who lost his long battle with a brain tumour in May, came second at the Open in in 1976 at Royal Birkdale, aged just 19 and only two years a pro, topping the European Tour Order of Merit that year. He’d go on to win the Open for the first time in 1979, where he carded 70 on his final round and birdied the 16th despite hitting his teeshot into a car park at Royal Lytham and St Anne’s. He went on to win again in 1984 and 1988. A true gentleman of the game, the Spaniard is still oft-mentioned and badly missed at Major tournaments.
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