Harrington wins (dinner guests lose out)

I reckon I did well to get a meal on the table tonight despite having one eye on the closing stages at Carnoustie. I think I had a premonition yesterday that Garcia would remain the nearly man, but not how close he would come to proving me wrong, or how long it would take for the whole thing to be over! As it was, as Romero stuffed his ball Out of Bounds I was stuffing the chicken, and as Padraig went in the burn (twice) I was chopping some pretty irregular carrots (in fact, I was lucky to get away with my fingers intact). Luckily, our Sunday dinner guests are also golfers and didn’t mind waiting for the end of the play-off for the meal to be on the table.
Fair result? Well, IMO each of the contenders had already lost the tournament, Harrington with his double bogey and Garcia when he missed the putt. I’m not surprised Harrington made the best recovery; he had won his reprieve, and throughout the play-off he had a look of grim determination.
A truly memorable last day, though maybe the chicken is best forgotten. I hope to remain Goddess of the Green, if not the Cuisine!

Open Predictions?

Can't resist passing on the pre-Open predictions from Don't Cost Nothing that none of the following can win the Open: - Scott, Cabrera, Mickelson, Singh, Garcia - whereas Woods, Donald, Rose Furyk and Els all could.
You can see where he's coming from. A few days ago I might have said the same, but I wonder if he'll have a change of heart over Garcia before Sunday - or will Garcia himself make that unneccessary?
With Woods languishing (though far from beaten) and Els in contention, it's looking wide open right now.

Big Time, Big Money

Since we seem to be having a question of the week, this one can be about Majors, and how much you would spend to see the big names play.
Two years ago we went to the Wales Open at Celtic Manor. Not a major by any means, but we had a very good day following Monty, Paul Lawrie and Ian Poulter. As it happens, Celtic Manor is only half an hour’s drive for us, and the entrance for the Friday was £5 each, so if you add the bridge toll (ouch! £4.50) and don’t add in the cost of our picnic (cheapskates!) we had a pretty good day out for under £20.
Then last summer I suggested that en route to a holiday in Scotland we could take in the Open at Hoylake. When I checked out the price it was £60 upwards - each. Hmmm. My parents used to get a real buzz from going to the Open when it was in Scotland, but I suspect the courses were a lot less crowded then. These days you get a better view from the comfort of your own front room. What’s it worth to you to be able to say ‘I was there?’ And how does the Open compare with other big events? (I admit I’ve paid £50 for a ticket to Wimbledon, and at least golf, unlike tennis, is rarely rained off!)

Great Golfing Moments

Looking for stuff about Carnoustie did remind me of its most famous failure, Jean Van De Velde, the handsome but hapless Frenchman who was leading on the final day and went AWOL on the eighteenth, ending up by taking off his socks and shoes and paddling in the burn, demonstrating that special grand folie of golf that leads us to follow a sudden loss of form with an even more spectacular loss of judgement, aka the ‘I’m-damned-if-I’m-taking-a-drop’ mindset. (Trust me on this, you’re damned if you don’t.)
To give him credit, our Jean did see the light and take the drop, but still lost his grip on the Claret Jug. This picture of the culprit burn (and the one in the last post) is from the press page of the Carnoustie Golf links site, and the sock moment is immortalised passim. There’s also a clip on Youtube of someone trying the exact shot that Jean passed up.
Note for ladies: - One Ian Baker-Finch in a similar situation once took off his pants - ? Whew, that’s actually American English for trousers. He still had his boxers on. Better luck next time, girls.
Note for book (rather than blog) readers: – a truly riotous round of golf including a shot from the water is recounted in Tim Lott’s White City Blue. (It’s near the end, p224 in the Penguin edition.) Okay it’s fiction, but it’s funny, and that goes for the whole book.

News from Carnoustie

According to Setanta, the course at Carnoustie is to be lengthened for this year’s Open in July. I confess to being distinctly underwhelmed by this revelation. We all know the pros can hit the ball a mile, but that’s not the only test of golf. I’ve also read somewhere that although St. Andrews was lengthened for 2005 to the extent of invading neighbouring courses, the length of the drives proved less critical than the need to get the right position in terms of the greens and greenside bunkers. And how much longer can courses get? As a one-time resident of St. Andrews, I’m beginning to wonder how long it will be before East Fife is one big golf-course. Even as a golfer that’s not something I would like to see.