Players prepare for the beast at Bethpage
Challenging U.S. Open course 7,426 yards of barbed wire
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/06/2009 (6267 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
FARMINGDALE, N.Y. — It’s fair to say that no one has ever accused the United States Golf Association of owning a sense of humour.
Case in point: seven years ago when the U.S. Open was here on the Black Course at Bethpage State Park, the rain and wind made it impossible for some of the short-to-medium hitters to carry the calf-high grass between the tee box and the fairway at the 10th hole. For them, the only reachable short grass was the players’ four-foot-wide walkway through the hay.
"This is the narrowest fairway I’ve ever seen," Nick Price said to a USGA official, as he walked along the path.
No word on whether the official got the joke.
"Yeah, and the most hilarious comment of all-time was Tom Meeks (then the USGA’s course-setup man), who said, ‘There’s nothing in the rule book that says a player has to be able to reach the fairway.’ That was his comment," Mike Weir of Bright’s Grove, Ont., said Tuesday, "and we thought, ‘Well, that’s probably true, there’s nothing in the rule book that says that — but that doesn’t make it right.’ "
But it’s an odd thing: by the same discernible degree to which it has lightened up on its course setups for the U.S. Open of late, the USGA has also taken an almost whimsical approach to its pairings for the first two rounds.
This year, it’s what Calgary’s Stephen Ames believes to be the "global television" method of matching nationalities for maximum TV exposure on foreign telecasts.
So for the first time in their professional careers — at least, as far as either one recalls — Ames and Weir will be paired together Thursday and Friday at Bethpage Black.
So will the Singhs — Vijay and Jeev Milkha — even though one’s from Fiji via Jacksonville and the other’s from India. Minor details. And Andres and Eduardo Romero of Argentina, with Spain’s Miguel Angel Jimenez along to speak the lingo and teach them about fine cigars.
And Justin Rose and Ross Fisher of England. And the Sorens of Denmark — Kjeldsen and Hansen, with another Hanson (Peter, from Sweden) to confuse the issue further. And Retief Goosen and Ernie Els of South Africa, and three Frenchmen in one group — Thomas Levet, Jean-Francois Lucquin and Raphael Jacquelin — which is more than the U.S. government normally likes to see gathered in one spot.
But that’s as far as the fun and games go. Like the sunshine, which splashed the grounds of this amazing complex of public courses on Long Island on Tuesday, and might again Wednesday before rain returns Thursday, the laughs stop when the tournament begins. It is, after all, the U.S. Open, and even if Meeks’ USGA successor, Mike Davis, is a kinder, gentler creature, a wet, cool Bethpage Black is going to be 7,426 yards of barbed wire.
"This morning, we played the new tee at the seventh — 525 yards, par-four," said Ames. "Henrik Stenson, Charl Schwartzel and myself — all three of us hit driver, 3-wood. Short. So we’re like, ‘Okay!’ First time I’ve ever played a course that has a par-four longer than a par-five. I don’t know, maybe they were thinking it was going to be dry, and the ball was going to run 80 yards.
"But today and Wednesday — fact — are the first two days of the month that it hasn’t rained. So it depends on the way they set it up. The USGA’s got to move (tees) forward."
"I’d say it definitely is," said Weir, asked if the course he played Tuesday in a practice round with 26-year-old Andrew Parr of London, Ont., felt like the longest he had ever experienced.
"It is manageable, because they’ve cut the rough progressively," said Ames, "You can move it 160 to 170 yards out of (the first cut) with 6- or 7-iron, which is fair. It’s the length of the course — oh, my God, it’s a beast."
— Canwest News Service