Paddy Harrington is Expecting a Rough British Open
by Ryan Ballengee on Jul 10, 2009 2:45 PM EDT
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PrintIrish Golf Desk has been covering Irishman Padraig Harrington in the past couple of weeks as he ventured to Turnberry on Sunday and Monday before playing in this week's Ladbrokes.com Irish PGA Championship. The Golf Desk heard comments from Harrington that lead me to believe that this British Open may well resemble Carnasty.
Pointing to the heavy rough at The European Club, he said: "It’s just like Turnberry. Played 36 holes there on Sunday and Monday and it is the thickest, closest rough I have ever seen to fairways and greens - ever.
"I had three people looking for a ball for a minute five yards off a green - max five yards off a green - and we couldn't find it. And we knew where it was!
"When I saw the course seven weeks ago I thought the winning score might be 16 under par. Now I am thinking of five under par.
"I don't particularly like playing golf courses with heavy rough because I consider that I would have the imagination to get up and down and play my way around, by hitting shots. This [the rough] takes that element out of it. While I don't find it any fun and I am dreading the prospect of it being really tight, I know competitively I am as good as anybody else in that situation, so why not.
"But it is playing very similar to a US Open of maybe four or five years ago. Maybe an Oakmont sort of thing. It is actually very close to Muirfield in 2002. You couldn't get away with missing the fairways there."
It really seems like the R&A and Peter Dawson waver on how tough they would like for the Open to play. Many years, they leave the setup fairly vanilla and let the weather determine the winning score. It appears that the R&A has recognized what Jay Flemma pointed out in his championship preview that Turnberry is defenseless without weather. Therefore, they wanted to guarantee the sanctity of Turnberry by installing some gnarly rough.
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Let's hope not...
…the R&A promised they would never grow rough they way they did at Carnoustie. That was ridiculous. Waist high and thick.
"this ball will fit in that fairway"
Agreed With Court
I never want to see the rough like it was in Carnoustie again, it was simply ridiculous.
Hopefully the groove rule change will help negate the need for rough that’s elephant-eye high and the powers-that-be will stop trying to amp up the punitive nature of missing the fairways.
by Charles Boyer on Jul 10, 2009 4:58 PM EDT up reply actions
paddy on playing lessons with the pros
he was trying to demonstrate a firm left leg at impact and was having a rough time doing it, so he pulled a Happy Gilmore drive as an easier way to learn it and still crushed it 300+ down the middle.
"Have a take and do not suck or you will get run." - Jim Rome
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