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Eight years after Royal Troon’s mem- orable duel between Henrik Stenson and Mickelson (a record winning score of 264), The Open returns in July to this west coast Scottish links with one of the trickiest short holes in championship golf, the Postage Stamp, No 8. Just 110 metres, but with an extremely narrow green, guarded by five bunkers (two with vertical faces), it is comparable to the island green 17th at TPC Sawgrass in its ability to worry the world’s best players and entertain the galleries. The wind blows across the hole, amping up the difficulty. Scotland is the place to be for three consecutive weeks in July, with the Scottish Open returning to the Renais- sance Club, and The Senior Open being played at Carnoustie. Northern Ireland hosts the Open in 2025 at Royal Portrush, and there’s a special Irish Open being played in September this year at Royal County Down, recognised as the No 1 course in the world outside the United States. The Irish Open has only been held there once before in the last 85 years, and that was in 2015, so this will be a momentous occasion for those who love classic links golf. SuperSport’s coverage of all five of the women’s majors has improved im- measurably in recent years, and these championships are more likely to in- troduce us to unfamiliar courses. This year the US Open goes to Lancaster CC. A William Flynn design, it flies under the radar compared to more famous Pennsylvania clubs such as Oakmont and Merion, and Lancaster ranks only No 7 in the state by Golf Digest. It did host the 2015 Women’s Open (In Gee Chun), but nothing on the men’s side. Sahalee, a course in the Pacific Northwest which has faded into obscu- rity, hosts the Women’s PGA in June. With narrow fairways framed by tower- ing trees, it once hosted the men’s PGA Championship (1998), the site of Vijay Singh’s first of three major victories. The women’s biennial Solheim Cup match between Europe and the USA, which saw a thrilling tie in Spain last year, will be played again this year to OFFBEAT VENUES FOR WOMEN’S MAJORS
WOMEN’S PGA Sahalee in the Pacific Northwest.
avoid future clashes with the Ryder Cup. It will compete instead with the Presidents Cup in September. The Sol- heim Cup is at Robert Trent Jones GC, outside Washington DC, where the inaugural Presidents Cup was played in 1994 and three times subsequently. President Obama was a club member. Canada will host the International and USA men’s teams at Royal Montreal, so the Presidents Cup will not venture outside North America. The last match to do so was in 2019 in Australia, and the next one in 2028 will again be to Australia, about the only other coun- try that can financially afford to stage it. Of the 14 matches played, just two have deviated from the North America- Australia axis, in South Africa in 2003 and Korea in 2015. PRESIDENTS CUP AT ROYAL MONTREAL When the match was last at Royal Montreal in 2007 there were four SA players in the 12-man International team under the captaincy of Gary Player – Ernie Els, Retief Goosen, Rory Sabbati- ni and Trevor Immelman. Currently, two South Africans, Christiaan Bezuiden- hout and Erik van Rooyen, are in the mix for selection, although they will have to keep on performing strongly to break into a team captained by Canadian Mark Weir, the former Masters champion. He will have six wildcard selections but will likely favour his own countrymen. One of America’s oldest courses, Newport Country Club, is hosting the US Senior Open in June. Situated in America’s smallest state, Rhode Island, south of Boston, it was the
first club to host the US Amateur and US Open in 1895, on a 9-hole layout, so has historical significance. Newport was one of the five founding clubs of the USGA. To celebrate the centennial, in 1995, the US Amateur returned, and was won by Tiger Woods. Then, in 2006, it was the turn of the US Women’s Open (Annika Sorenstam) to visit. It will be interesting to see which South African men and women qualify as our representatives for the Olympics in
US SENIOR OPEN Newport CC was one of the first courses in the US.
16 GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA
MARCH/APRIL 2024
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