I’m not sure where the time goes but I’ve just racked up my 25th Open Championship. I thought the R&A would’ve commissioned a limited-edition commemorative dish rag to flog in the merchandise tent at Royal Troon. But they didn’t. Maybe for my 50th, eh?
Anyway, if you were to document this glorious longevity in visual form then it would probably look a bit like that old illustration that portrayed the ascent of man. You know, that one that starts with an ape-like figure shuffling around on all fours and slowly morphs into a striding, upright human?
Of course, my evolution at The Open has slithered the other way. The descent of man if you please.
After a quarter-of-a-century spent hunched, slumped and contorted over the laptop, your correspondent now resembles some primitive, grunting, knuckle-dragging ancestor of the bloomin’ gibbon line.
The 152nd Open is done and dusted. In fact, the tin lid has been shoved onto men’s major season for another year. You’ve only got about nine months to wait until it all starts up again at the Masters.
The interminable previews of the Augusta showpiece will probably start tomorrow. Oh look, there’s a panning shot of Amen Corner and some syrupy schmaltz about a few flowers to get you in the mood.
The Masters, of course, has always benefitted from this prolonged sense of anticipation. As for the three other majors? Well, they come at us so quickly these days you half expect to hear a panicked shriek of ‘fore’ before ducking for cover.
Everything is a complete frenzy, isn’t it? Before a ball had been struck in anger at Royal Troon, all and sundry were being implored to enter the ticket ballot for the 2025 Open at Royal Portrush before the deadline at the end of this month. These are breathless times, folks.
The final men’s major of the year arrived amid a riot of sport on the other side of the pond. Thank goodness England’s football team didn’t win the Euros. The Open would’ve been relegated to the news in brief. Golf’s ongoing fight for relevance in this frantic environment goes on.
I don’t know about you, but there’s a nagging feeling of unfulfillment as I chisel away at this column. You probably have the same niggle reading the thing.
The rotten summer hasn’t helped. Let’s face it, the last few weeks, by and large, have been as dank as Sawney Bean’s cave. If you were at Troon on a sodden Saturday, you’re probably still nursing a debilitating dose of trench foot.
Sun-soaked TV footage displayed in the media center, meanwhile, of yellow, crisp fairways, sideburns and flares from Opens of yore generated a certain wistfulness.
Weather-wise, certainly in this unfailingly disappointing country, it feels like the golf season hasn’t even started, yet the men’s majors are already consigned to the history books. In a jam-packed schedule, there’s a hectic desire to get them all out of the way as quickly as possible. I’m not really sure who benefits.
You’ve had just 98 days between Scottie Scheffler slipping into the green jacket at the Masters and Xander Schauffele kissing the Claret Jug at The Open on Sunday.
Some folk have probably forgotten what happened at the PGA Championship and the U.S. Open such is the crash, bang, wallop nature of the calendar. Before you can say, ‘let’s sit back, reflect on the latest major and savor its majesty’ you’re mired in a gloop of build-up for the next one.
The scheduling of tournaments around the world can be a complex, flustered palaver on par with transferring various items into a different suitcase at an airport check-in when you’ve just been informed that one of the bags exceeds the weight limit.
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The high and mighty PGA Tour, of course, has to get its FedEx Cup playoff series shoehorned into the prime time before the American football season consumes everything on this side of the pond. The rest of the golfing world has to pander to the demands of Uncle Sam.
The DP World Tour, with a closing swing of decent events coming up after a lengthy break, has desires of its own while golf’s return to the Olympics – the stroke-play event starts in Paris next week – has added another layer of complexity to this scheduling lark. In the years when there’s not a Ryder Cup, there’s a Presidents Cup. Yet more stuff to squeeze in.
To be honest, I wouldn’t mind if The Open got dunted back a few weeks into August. Or we could just cut the whole field to eight players and hold it in October like the very first one at Prestwick in 1860?
The weather would probably be better than flippin’ July. I’m getting carried away there but I’m just not a great fan of this April to July, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it major maelstrom.
The golf writers will always find something to grumble about. It could be worse, I suppose. When Jack Nicklaus won his first PGA Championship in Dallas back in 1963, he achieved it just seven days after finishing third in The Open at Royal Lytham.
There was barely a spare moment to wash undergarments through the mangle for the fraught transatlantic turnaround.
Here in 2024, the men’s majors have passed in a flash. As my 25 Opens prove, time really does fly.
