The quartet of future championships include the 2020 US Girls’ Junior, 2034 US Amateur, 2038 US Open and 2045 US Women’s Open.

“This partnership with The Country Club gives juniors, amateurs and professionals alike the opportunity to vie for a USGA championship and etch their names in golfing history at one of the nation’s most iconic venues,” said John Bodenhamer, USGA chief championships officer, in a press release. “We look forward to witnessing the incredible talent and passion that will be on display in the coming years.”

One of the USGA’s five founding member clubs, The Country Club last hosted the US Open in 2022 when Matt Fitzpatrick won the title by a stroke over Will Zalatoris and Scottie Scheffler. The Englishman also won the US Amateur when it was played for the sixth and most recent time there in 2013. Fitzpatrick joined Jack Nicklaus as the only golfer to win a US Amateur and US Open at the same club.

When the US Girls’ Junior is held in 2030 it will mark 80 years since the only previous time the championship has been played at The Country Club.

By hosting the US Women’s Open in 2045, The Country Club will become just the 23rd course to have hosted the men’s and women’s national championship. Fifteen have already done so while another seven will accomplish the feat between now and 2045 before TCC joins them.

The Country Club/USGA championships
1902 US Women’s Amateur: Genevieve Hecker
1910 US Amateur: William Fownes Jr
1913 US Open: Francis Ouimet
1922 US Amateur: Jess Sweetser
1932 Walker Cup: United States
1934 US Amateur: Lawson Little
1941 US Women’s Amateur: Betty Hicks Newell
1953 US Girls’ Junior: Mildred Meyerson
1957 US Amateur: Hillman Robbins
1963 US Open: Julius Boros
1968 US Junior: Eddie Pearce
1973 Walker Cup: United States
1982 US Amateur: Jay Sigel
1988 US Open: Curtis Strange
1995 US Women’s Amateur: Kelli Kuehne
2013 US Amateur: Matt Fitzpatrick
2022 US Open: Matt Fitzpatrick

Main image: Boston Globe

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Now that the 2023 major season is complete, which of the 30 LIV Golf League members who teed it up in at least one of golf’s four biggest tournaments this year produced the best overall performance?

Well, only one of those players came away with a trophy, so the answer is easy. No LIV player had a better run in the majors this season than Smash Captain Brooks Koepka, who won the PGA Championship after tying for second at the Masters. He also made the cut in the last two majors.
As for the other 29 …

To rank the LIV players who competed in the majors, we came up with a relatively simple formula. For each $1,000 in prize money won at a major, a player receives 1 point. Thus, $50,000 in earnings is worth 50 points, $100,000 is worth 100 points and so on. The only caveat — a player must have made the cut to get those points.

While players do receive prize money at majors even if they don’t make the cut, for the majority of the majors, those purses are distributed evenly among all missed cuts regardless of score. For our purposes, we weighted points for missed cuts depending on how close a player came to the cut line. Missing the cut by one stroke = 5 points; by two strokes = 4 points; by 3 strokes = 3 points; 4 strokes = 2 points, and 5 strokes = 1 point. Players who missed the cut by more than five strokes received no points.

In using those calculations, here’s how the 30 LIV players ranked in the overall majors. And just a reminder — these are strictly unofficial rankings, purely a fun exercise in how to appraise the major starters.

1. BROOKS KOEPKA (5,057 points)
His PGA Championship win was worth 3,150 points, and his tie for second at the Masters worth 1,584 points.
2. CAMERON SMITH (1,637 points)
Most of his points came from a solo fourth at the US Open (991 points) and a tie for ninth at the PGA (465 points).
3. PHIL MICKELSON (1,622 points)
His tie for second with Koepka at the Masters was the big point-producer.
4. PATRICK REED (1,086 points)
Joins Koepka and Smith as the only LIV golfers to make the cut in all four majors this year. The majority of his points came from a tie for fourth at the Masters (744 points) and a tie for 18th at the PGA (214 points).
5. BRYSON DECHAMBEAU (965 points)
His tie for fourth at the PGA was worth 720 points. Also played well at the US Open with a tie for 20th (200 points).
6. DUSTIN JOHNSON (521 points)
A tie for 10th at the US Open gave him 435 points. Made the cut at the Masters and PGA. Alas, no need to discuss the Open.
7. JOAQUIN NIEMANN (376 points)
Finished in the top 20 at the Masters (261 points) and had a decent result at the US Open (108 points). Came close to the cut line in the other two majors (combined seven points).
8. MITO PEREIRA (286 points)
His tie for 18th at the PGA was worth 214 points.
9. HENRIK STENSON (233 points)
His only major start this year was at the Open Championship, where he tied for 13th, the best result among all LIV golfers at Royal Liverpool.
10. HAROLD VARNER III (215 points)
Tied for 29th in both the Masters (125 points) and PGA (90 points).
11. LAURIE CANTER (188 points)
Earned a spot in the Open through final qualifying and tied for 17th in his only major start.
12. ABRAHAM ANCER (170 points)
Finished consistently in the middle of the pack in three majors – Masters, US Open and Open.
13. SERGIO GARCIA (145 points)
Almost all his points came from a tie for 27th at the US Open.
14. THOMAS PIETERS (140 points)
He was middle of the pack in two majors — Masters and PGA — and made the cut at the Open.
15. LOUIS OOSTHUIZEN (122 points)
Tied for 23rd at the Open to earn all his points.
16. TALOR GOOCH (100 points)
The current LIV Golf points leader made the cut in just one of three starts, tying for 34th at the Masters.
17. DAVID PUIG (85 points)
The 21-year-old from Spain made his major debut at the US Open and tied for 39th after a sizzling final round.
18. RICHARD BLAND (84 points)
The 50-year-old from England played in just one major, tying for 33rd at the Open.
19. SEBASTIÁN MUÑOZ (49 points)
Was a qualifier for the US Open and tied for 49th.
20. CHARL SCHWARTZEL (48 points)
Tied for 50th at the Masters, a tournament in which he has a lifetime exemption thanks to his 2011 win.
21. DEAN BURMESTER (36 points)
Finished 54th in his only major start at the PGA.
22. SIHWAN KIM (32 points)
Tied for 62nd in his only major start at the PGA.
23. BRENDAN STEELE (5 points)
Came within a stroke of making the cut at the PGA.
24. ANIRBAN LAHIRI (4 points)
Came within two strokes of making the cut at the PGA.
25. MARTIN KAYMER (2 points)
The two-time major winner had to withdraw with injury at the PGA and was four strokes off the cut line at the US Open.
26. JASON KOKRAK (1 point)
Missed the cut by five strokes at the Masters.
T27. BRANDEN GRACE, KEVIN NA, CARLOS ORTIZ, BUBBA WATSON (0 points)
Na withdrew from the Masters mid-tournament with an injury, while the other three missed the cut in their respective majors by more than five strokes.

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Rory McIlroy remains the runner-up of the 2023 US Open. But a little more than a week after he finished one shot short of Wyndham Clark at Los Angeles Country Club, a USGA executive acknowledged that a free drop McIlroy received during a critical moment of the final round was incorrectly administered.

In an interview with Sports Illustrated, USGA Chief Governance Officer Thomas Pagel said that onsite referee Courtney Myhrum, a veteran rules official and member of the USGA Executive Committee, properly ruled that McIlroy was entitled to free relief from an embedded ball under Rule 16.3 after his third shot on the par-5 14th hole lodged into a sod wall above a greenside bunker. However, after further review, Pagel noted that the place in the “general area” of the embedded ball from which McIlroy took his point of relief was misidentified.

As McIlroy, who trailed Clark at the time by one shot, and Myhrum walked through McIlroy’s options, they used a spot to the side of McIlroy’s embedded ball to begin measuring the one-club length area in which he could receive relief. Pagel said that instead there was a spot immediately behind the ball that could have still been deemed “the general area” that should have been used as the reference point.

“When you start dealing with vertical faces, that’s where the question is,” Pagel told Sports Illustrated. “In this case, there was a lot going on. But there was a place behind the ball where he could have started to measure.”

Had McIlroy used the spot behind the ball, he still could have measured the club length to the right of that spot and taken a drop on the same shelf from which he played his fourth shot (he could not drop his ball in the bunker under the rules). Pagel says the difference would have been likely no more than 18 inches from where he played his shot, essentially leaving McIlroy the same difficult pitch to a sloping green.

McIlroy hit his fourth shot nine feet past the hole and was unable to convert the par attempt, recording his lone bogey of the round. When Clark birdied the hole in the group after, Clark took a three-shot lead that gave him the cushion needed to hold on to the title after bogeying the 15th and 16th holes.

While acknowledging the mistake regarding where the relief was taken, Pagel made the point of exonerating McIlroy of any misdoing.

“From where he started measuring from, he didn’t get a break. And he did all of this at the discretion of the referee,” Pagel said. “He wasn’t doing anything to gain an advantage and as he was told how to apply the rule on where to drop.”

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On a day of low scoring, you have to scroll pretty far down the leaderboard to find the name Wyndham Clark. But good luck finding anyone in the field who flashed more smiles during the first round of the Travelers Championship.

Just four days following his US Open victory at Los Angeles Country Club, Clark was on the East Coast teeing it up at TPC River Highlands. And it didn’t take long for him to feel different than he has during any other tournament of his career.

“I definitely was a little less stressed or anxious today than I think I normally would be to start a tournament,” Clark said. “I was more relaxed. I didn’t have much expectations, which was really nice. And then obviously the fan interaction was great. We went off early, which normally when I’m going off on a Thursday that early there is hardly any fans watching me and there as of decent amount, so that was kind of nice.”

Clark was announced as the “US Open champion” before beginning his round bright and early at 7.35am on the 10th tee along with Justin Thomas and Max Homa. He took some playful ribbing from Thomas, but received plenty of crowd support throughout the day on his way to a solid opening-round two-under 68.

“Every hole they were saying: ‘The champ’s here,’ and: ‘Congrats,’” Clark said of the fans. People know my name now, which is nice. Four or five years ago they didn’t know who I am. So it’s been an amazing day.”

Since holding off Rory McIlroy to win the US Open on Sunday it’s been a bit of a whirlwind. Clark says he’s been amazed by some of the “influential” people he’s received calls and texts from, and his media tour of New York City included stops at the “Today” show and “Good Morning America” earlier in the week. He admitted he “hardly had any prep” for this week. So little, in fact, he forgot to tweak his 4-iron that gave him problems at LACC.

He hit his worst shot with that club on Thursday, his shot on the par-3 fifth hole clunked off a teenager’s head. But like he did at LACC time and time again, Clark scrambled for par.

“I had an incredible up and down, so I think he probably saved me,” said Clark, who finished the morning wave six shots behind early leader Keegan Bradley. “So whatever his name is, thank you.”

Clark says his competitive drive has him wanting to do well, but you can’t blame him if deep down he’s treating this week’s tournament as a bonus. In addition to the US Open, Clark won another designated event at the Wells Fargo Championship last month, bringing his winnings over the past six weeks to $7.6 million after earning only $2.6 million over the previous six years.

“No, hasn’t hit me yet,” Clark said. “I’m still kind of on the high. I’m sure as the week goes on it might hit me, but fortunately I have two week off after this to get refreshed and ready for the rest of the year.”

In the meantime, Clark is still in this tournament at two under after Day 1. And he’s still enjoying his victory lap.

The post Why Wyndham Clark enjoyed his first round as a major champion so much appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Only days after Los Angeles Country Club completed hosting its first US Open, the area has secured another national championship at maybe the most unlikely of courses in the modern age of majors with big crowds and massive hospitality footprints.

On Wednesday, the USGA announced that Riviera Country Club, which last hosted the US Open in 1948 and annually stages the PGA Tour’s Genesis Invitational, has agreed to hold the 2031 US Open.

The Los Angeles Times reported on Tuesday that the news was communicated in an email to members on Tuesday night by Riviera President Megan Watanabe, the daughter of the club’s long-time owner, Noboru Watanabe.

“It has been one of my biggest goals to bring back major championships to Riviera since I started working for Riviera, and it truly represents the culmination of a dream that my family has had since acquiring the club in 1989,” wrote Watanabe, the club’s first female president.

“Riviera Country Club is a truly spectacular course that holds a special place in the game’s history,” John Bodenhamer, USGA chief championships officer, said in a USGA statement on Wednesday. “We are thrilled to bring the US Open back to the site of such historic moments for golf and the USGA, and look forward to writing a new chapter in 2031.”

Riviera already agreed in 2022 to host the 2026 US Women’s Open. But it figured that might be the attendance and corporate limit for a layout that sits in a canyon with little space between holes. The general consensus has been that the property was too small to host a 21st century major, particularly considering it does not have a second golf course to be used for staging, like at LACC and Torrey Pines. Parking and traffic would also seem to be of significant concern, with only a couple of two-lane, frequently congested roads leading to the Riviera in the community of Pacific Palisades.

However, the USGA has opted over the last decade to choose more historical courses, even if they don’t present the same attendance opportunities. Those sites include Merion, The Country Club and this year, Los Angeles Country Club, where only 22,000 tickets were distributed per day. Size can be deceiving at times, because the USGA built fewer, but taller skyboxes that provided the largest corporate footprint in US Open history, with significant proceeds going from LACC’s sale of hospitality to the USGA coffers.

Television is also a consideration. The USGA has seen growing opportunities to please broadcast partners by having primetime coverage in the East at Pebble Beach, The Olympic Club, Torrey Pines and Chambers Bay.

NBC Sports said on Tuesday that viewership of last week’s US Open, won by Wyndham Clark, was up 27 per cent compared to the 2022 championship at The Country Club in Brookline, Massachusetts, where Matt Fitzpatrick won. The network said it averaged 6.2 million viewers across NBC and Peacock. That was nine per cent better than 2021, when Torrey Pines in San Diego hosted the US Open captured by Jon Rahm.

Riviera certainly fits the bill of the courses that Bodenhamer has called the “cathedrals of golf”. The George C Thomas design is a classic, where many of the game’s greats have won — with the notable exception of Tiger Woods. Riviera last hosted a major in 1995, when Steve Elkington beat Colin Montgomerie in a playoff.

Securing Riviera gives the USGA 12 consecutive years of future US Open sites, and 16 of the next 19 are set through 2042. The only open dates now are 2036, 2038 and 2040. In all, 20 sites have been determined through 2051.

The next US Open played in California will be at Pebble Beach in 2027. The legendary seaside course, which hosts the US Women’s Open for the first time in July, also is set for U.S. Opens in 2032 — the year after Riviera — 2037 and 2044.

Los Angeles Country Club is scheduled to hold the 2039 US Open.

The 10th hole is considered one of the greatest short par 4s in the world. Keyur Khamar

Riviera certainly fits the bill of the courses that Bodenhamer has called the “cathedrals of golf”. The George C. Thomas design is a classic, where many of the game’s greats have won — with the notable exception of Tiger Woods. Riviera last hosted a major in 1995, when Steve Elkington beat Colin Montgomerie in a playoff.

Securing Riviera gives the USGA 12 consecutive years of future US Open sites, and 16 of the next 19 are set through 2042. The only open dates now are 2036, 2038 and 2040. In all, 20 sites have been determined through 2051.

The next US Open played in California will be at Pebble Beach in 2027. The legendary seaside course, which hosts the US Women’s Open for the first time in July, also is set for U.S. Opens in 2032 — the year after Riviera — 2037 and 2044.

Los Angeles Country Club is scheduled to hold the 2039 US Open.

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Ask Australia’s Min Woo Lee how he got into the field at the $20 million Travelers Championship despite being a Special Temporary Member on the PGA Tour, and he’ll tell you it’s a funny story.

Lee originally planned to spend this week watching his sister Minjee, a two-time LPGA major winner, compete at the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship at New Jersey’s famed Baltusrol Golf Club. He was not in the field for Travelers, a designated event, and so it was a nicely timed week off. Those plans still looked firm Saturday night in Los Angeles, after the third round of the U.S. Open, when Lee was two under par and eight shots off the 54-hole lead.

That night, Min Woo got a text from Adam Scott, Lee’s countryman and childhood idol, with an offer to ride on the former World No.1’s private jet to Hartford, Connecticut. “I’m not in Travelers, sorry,” Lee responded, to which Scott had a pointed reply that Lee paraphrased: “Just finish in the top 10 then and you can come. Go get it done.”

Indeed, a top-10 finish at LACC would qualify Lee to start in the next PGA Tour event if not already in the field.

Inspired, Lee shot a bogey-free 67 in the final round to finish tied for fifth. It was his best result in a major championship and first top-10 on the PGA Tour. Sure enough, Lee and his caddie, Stu Davidson, hitched a ride on Scott’s plane.

A ride in Adam Scott’s private jet inspired tour pro’s impressive Sunday US Open finish. Mike Mulholland

“It was a really cool feeling for Adam to do that for me. He’s been a good mentor in my career,” Lee said of the 14-time PGA Tour winner. “I grew up watching him win the [2013] Masters and now he’s become a friend. It’s special.”

Lee has until the end of the season, which will include the autumn portion of the schedule after the FedEx Cup Playoffs, to earn at least the same non-member points as No. 125 in the standings to secure his PGA Tour card next season. With a T-6 at the Players Championship in March and the T-5 at the US Open, he’s well on track. Either way, the 24-year-old is feeling good about his attempt to transition from the DP World Tour, where he’s won twice, to the PGA Tour.

The native of Perth, Western Australia just wants to examine why he sometimes has a poor round within a big event that drops him out of contention, like a Saturday 74 at LACC when he was only three off the lead.

“I really have to dig deep on why the occasional bad round happens but my good golf is awesome I feel I can compete out here,” Lee said. “If I do the right things, experience will start to develop. I’ve only played in a handful of majors, so it’s nice to play well in the early stages of my career. I’m excited to play Travelers this week.”

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US Open week started with Johnny Miller explaining how he taught himself to swing a golf club. It ended with Wyndham Clark explaining how he taught himself to swing a golf club.

It’s funny how things like that work. Though, perhaps, it shouldn’t have been too surprising. It was a minimalist week all around at Los Angeles Country Club. There were fewer fans. Smaller grandstands. Less rough. Lower scores. In many ways, it makes Clark and his understated approach to the golf swing the perfect champion for the place.

Clark has one of those golf swings which makes the rest of us wonder how he could ever hit a bad shot. A big backswing turn, and uninterrupted body turn on the downswing, a follow through which wraps the club loosely around is next.

Like the sultry swing of Nelly Korda, Clark is the child of a professional tennis player. You can always tell the best athletes by the smoothness in the movement in the connection between body and club. Like Korda, there’s no buffering in Clark’s move. It’s automatic.

Three. Shot. Lead. @Wyndham_Clark widens his lead after a stellar second shot into No. 14 leads to birdie #USOpen pic.twitter.com/eoEPd6yzsh

— U.S. Open (USGA) (@usopengolf) June 19, 2023

Except golf swings don’t work that way. Hitting a golf ball straight is like sending thread through the eye of a needle. No matter how good you get, it never becomes easy. The only way to move the golf ball exactly the way you want is to not touch it at all.

Clark’s swing looked good, but his shots didn’t. He had no idea where his ball was going, or why. The more explanations from experts he heard, the more confused he got. It sent him down a delightfully simplistic path.

“Now, when I’m in practice, I’m always trying to get back to neutral. If one day it’s really cutty I’ll hitting huge draws on the range. Then some days it gets kind of too draw-heavy I’ll hit huge cuts and get it back to neutral,” he says. “I felt like I’ve kept my swing in those parameters to where regardless I can play good golf if I’m hitting a little draw or a little cut.”

Clark was backing into a method with some good science behind it.

The human brain works on feedback, and it uses that feedback to set up boundaries to stay within. Just as driving between the lines only makes sense when there are actual lines on the road, your brain only knows what to do when it knows what not to do.

Take note. The next time you’re on the range, try hitting a duck hook. Then try hitting a wipey slice. Then try hitting one straight. Yes, you’re good enough to try. And I bet you’ll like the results.

1. Speed is fun, but boring is best

Gordon Sargent. Ross Kinnaird

There aren’t many players other pros will stop and watch, but watching amateur Gordon Sargent hitting balls on the range earlier this week, pros couldn’t resist taking a look. Sargent is a lean six foot with a mean 125mph clubhead speed. When he completes the formality of turning pro, he’ll instantly become one of the longest players on tour.
Gordon has the kind of whipping speed that his fellow US Open contenders would spend a not-so-small fortune to have themselves. But of course, you always want what you can’t have. They may envy his speed, but after his final round I asked Sargent: What does he envy about their games?
“They limit their mistakes really well,” he said. “They don’t really hit it out of position too often, and if they do, they just get it back into position. The leaders aren’t making doubles out there, and that was the key. Consistency, limiting the mistakes is what I envy in their games and what I’m trying to get better at.”

2. The safest play isn’t always the smartest

Speaking of getting back into position, throughout the tournament, I found myself thinking about the difference between playing safe, and playing smart. There’s a decent amount of overlap between the two, but the safest possible play isn’t always the smartest one.
Rory’s second shot on the 14th hole struck me as a more-safe-than-smart moment, but the sixth hole was another flash point for this idea. The players who went for it had a lower scoring average, more birdies on average and fewer bogeys than those who didn’t. Yet more players laid up than went for it. Tony Finau was one of those players who laid up all four days on the sixth. How come?
“They kind of just give you the fairway on that hole,” he said.

When we talk about Rory’s near-misses, it’s easy to focus on vague intangible stuff (‘he doesn’t want it enough!’) rather than specific, overly-cautious tactical mistakes he’ll sometimes make in these spots.

Here’s one example from the final round I can’t stop thinking about

?

— LKD (@LukeKerrDineen) June 19, 2023

Laying up is certainly a more predictable way of playing that whole, and there’s a certain comfort in that. Going for it is messier. You don’t know what chip you’re going to have, or from what angle, or what the lie is going to be. But it’s worth it. Go for the sixth green all four days, and you’ve made up almost a stroke over the rest of the field.
Yet it was the lure of safe predictability that lured many players away from making the statistically correct call on the sixth hole last week. It’s a trap we all fall into from time to time. Even those playing in the US Open.

3. Work on your body, not just your swing

The US Open was the first time I ever got to watch super-bomber Wilco Nienabar hit golf balls. It was an impressive sight. Golf shots sound different when pros hit them. And his shots sound different from his fellow pros.
After launching a few drives over the next at the back of the range — some 330 yards away — I asked Nienabar how his speed came to be.
“I spent the winters in South Africa playing every other sport,” he said. “Rugby, football, cricket. Then when I came back and played golf in the summertime, I could move better.”
Playing other sports is better advice for junior golfers than adults. Golf is my way of playing sports. But I think there’s a lesson to learn from Nienabar nonetheless: That amateur golfers sometimes think the only way to get better is to tinker with your swing. But often it’s getting your body more flexible, strong, and generally more mobile that will pay greater dividends. Better yet, it’s some of the easiest stuff to work on.

4. Pros are so good from the fairway

The way pros picked apart Los Angeles Country Club was a hit for the width and angles crowd — that’s the idea that a golf course can be both wide and difficult for pros, because wider fairways allow players to pursue different but equal strategies.
There’s truth there, of course, but at least part of where we saw this idea fall apart at the US Open was the unintended side effect of handing players wide, relatively defenceless fairways.
Wyndham Clark was not pursuing an angle when he sliced his drive on his 72nd hole, but found the fairway anyway. It’s just one example, but a high profile one which illustrates how the wide fairways last week screwed up the good-shot, bad-shot feedback loop. Clark hit a bad shot into a good lie. And good fairway lies are all pros need to attack greens.
“Yes, but only when the greens are this soft,” Keith Mitchell, who was a fan of LACC, said in response to that.
But keeping the greens on that razor’s edge is the problem. They may be the perfect amount of crispy at the start of the week, but spiral out of control after a few hours of sunshine. It all works at the Open Championship because of its laissez-faire attitude. The character of that year’s Open is whatever Mother Nature dictates.
Like it or not, the majority of golf fans want the US Open to operate with a heavier hand, which means giving every inch of it some teeth.

5. Speed control on the greens is more important than you think

Rory McIlroy reacts to a missed birdie putt on the 10th green. Richard Heathcote

I can feel myself getting a little long winded, so I’m going to buzz through the rest of these. Plus, I’m writing this article from an airplane, and that airplane is about to land. A true test of writing-on-deadline if there’s ever been one.
On the 13th hole on Saturday, Rory McIlroy had a long birdie putt from the front of the green to the back. As soon as he hit it, he didn’t like it.
“Hit it!” he said forcefully in frustration, as he marked his ball about six feet away. He missed the next putt.
After his final round, McIlroy pinpointed his speed control on the greens as the primary issue. If there’s one area of the game where the rest of us don’t think about enough, it’s speed control.
Three putts come from bad speed control. Usually on the first putt. Missed short putts come from bad speed control. Usually from powering it through the break. Making putts is hard, but dialling in your speed control will make life on the greens so much easier.

6. The pivot powers your swing

A quick note on Ryan Gerard, who popped into the early US Open lead for a moment on Thursday, and made the cut on Friday. He’s got an unusual swing. Sort of a mix between Zach Johnson and Jon Rahm.
It’s the kind of swing that many coaches would’ve changed the moment they saw it. And honestly, for good reason. Most golfers would hit hooks from here. But Gerard learned not what he should do, but what he could do. The club may be flat, shut, and short at the top of his swing, but if he made a full turn on the backswing, and an aggressive turn on the downswing, he’d deliver the club square.

Ryan Gerard shot one-under yesterday. He knows he has an unconventional golf swing.

"I've been told my swing looks like Daniel Berger and Jon Rahm had an aneurysm on the downswing."https://t.co/I9MuILtvP4 pic.twitter.com/WJNQEIAhOM

— LKD (@LukeKerrDineen) June 16, 2023

“I hit just a little fade,” he says.
The way you turn — your pivot, as coaches call it — is the engine of every golf swing. It’s what makes quirky moves work. If something’s off in your swing, look at the way you turn, both back and through. Just like the engine in your car, that’s often where the issue lies.

7. Dialling-in spin is a control key

Shrouded underneath the Bryson DeChambeau’s whole ‘my driver sucks’ controversy was actually a pretty fascinating situation:
Pros calibrate their equipment to have less backspin means more distance. DeChambeau likes hitting draws because they have less backspin and therefore even more distance. Toe hits reduce backspin.
When he hit the ball on the screws with his driver, life was great. When DeChambeau missed the ball slightly on the toe, his ball would come off with so little spin that he hit shots that would effectively divebomb out of the air, down into the ground.
But last week, DeChambeau revealed a change of heart. He’s been adding more backspin via his equipment (he’s still hitting draws). He knows it’s costing him some distance, but he’s come to appreciate the control.
“I would be the longest in the field, but I have 3,000 [RPMs] of spin to try and control it better,” DeChambeau says. “That’s the main reason I have it this week. When it gets so firm and fast, you need it to help you keep something in the fairway.”
What can the rest of us learn from all this?
Well, if you’re a slicer with a big high-right miss, you probably have too much spin. If you hit hooks, and your misses dive low and to the right, you may have the DeChambeau problem of too little spin. Go talk to a club fitter to get it sorted.

8. Hovland’s chipping is sneaky amazing

Speaking of spin and improving stuff, shout out to Viktor Hovland, who finished inside the top 10 in strokes gained/around the green. Hovland is a low spin guy because he hits so far up on the ball with his driver. Great for distance and general ball striking, but a quality that needed some massaging around the greens.

 

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Earlier this week, I spotted Hovland hitting some nasty flop shots from the fringe of LACC’s practice green. A cool shot, but an intentional one: Hovland’s been working with Joe Mayo on bringing his angle of attack down and the low point of his short game swing more forward. Oversimplified, he’s trying to hit more down on the ball. That gives him more spin. His chipping looks legitimately good.

9. Jon Rahm has a feeling

I love when pros talk about the stuff they’re feeling and working on in their golf swings. But how do you describe a feeling? Don’t ask Jon Rahm, because he’s not sure either.
“Yesterday I went to the range in the afternoon and found a very comfortable feel that I felt like I could replicate often,” he said. “It’s a feel that helps me turn better, I don’t know how to explain it.”
Glad it worked, John. If you need me, I’ll be thinking of what it was.

The post Nine things I learned from players at the 2023 US Open appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Jon Rahm didn’t just show up for the first pre-tournament press conference of the Travelers Championship on Tuesday, he arrived at the media centre a full five minutes early ready to go. If the two-time major champ had any sort of major championship hangover from the US Open, he didn’t show it. Then again, the situation was a lot different from the last time this happened a couple months ago.

The PGA Tour has been jam-packed this season for top players, most notably with two of the new designated events falling the week after a major championship. Rahm drew praise for playing at Hilton Head in April just days after claiming the green jacket. But on Tuesday the only green on his mind were the bright shoes he wore as he got right back to work.

“Oh, way easier, way easier,” Rahm said when asked to compare this week to the one at Harbour Town following his Masters win. “I was pretty drained on that Thursday still when I tee’d up at Harbour Town, and mainly because that week was unique in how demanding it was on the weekend with all the starts and stops and the tough whether. Every time I win it takes a little bit more out of you.”

Rahm didn’t win at the US Open, but he did finish strong with a Sunday 65 at LACC. That vaulted him into the top 10, but he acknowledged that not all high finishes are created equal.

“For the better part of the weekend I was never in contention, so all that stress and intensity that comes with it wasn’t there,” Rahm continued. “Even though I finished great, my round was done at 3pm and I was able to enjoy most of the broadcast like everybody else. That extra energy spent on battling Sunday afternoon at the Open, so energy-wise I’m much better.”

There is a big difference from going between Augusta and Hilton Head versus a cross-country flight from LA to the East Coast. But as a travel vet, Rahm offered three pieces of advice to overcome potential jet lag: 1. Stay hydrated on the flight, 2. Stick with your meal plan, 3. Hit the ground running. Literally.

“And then when you land, if you have time and a gym are whatever it may be, to get a little bit of exercise in,” said Rahm, whose T-25 in 2016 is his best finish in three previous starts at the Travelers, the last of which came in 2020. “It doesn’t need to be crazy. It could be 30, 40 minutes of just some kind of stretching or whatever to get the blood flowing a little bit more so your body can just naturally recover and get things moving. If you just sit for five hours and then you arrive here late, have dinner, and go to bed, I don’t feel my best the next morning.”

Good to know. Rahm also had some advice for golf’s newest major champ, Wyndham Clark, who is also in the field this week with another $20 million purse on the line.

“After winning I’m pretty sure he doesn’t care how it goes this week,” Rahm said. “So, I really couldn’t tell you. It’s so personal. All I could tell him is to enjoy the win as much as possible. You know, if you want to focus and play this week, go ahead, but just take the time to enjoy those moments, just because, you know, they’re not easy to come by.”

Judging by the video that emerged of Clark chugging from the US Open trophy, he appears to be doing just that. So Rahm would definitely approve — he just might suggest that Clark focus even more than normal on his hydration before teeing it up on Thursday.

The post Why Jon Rahm is much better prepared to play the week after a major this time — and his advice to Wyndham Clark appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

It always annoys me when we analyse the rounds of professional golfers and talk about the intangible things. Heart, attitude, grit, mindset.

Rory’s problem is that he didn’t want it enough.

I just can’t quite make sense of it. The micro stuff, I can make sense of that. Looking at specific tactics, techniques, strategies. Things guys could’ve done differently. I can make sense of that, though unfortunately, I tend to think about it too much. And following Rory McIlroy’s tough one-shot loss at the 2023 US Open, I keep turning one moment around in my mind, over and over again: McIlroy’s lay-up second shot on Los Angeles Country Club’s 14th hole on Sunday. The pivotal moment in a sequence of events that lead to his only bogey of the day.

I have a sneaking suspicion that McIlroy was overly conservative on this occasion, and may have made a tactical error. I’ll break down why. But first, for all you McIlroy fans and maybe even Rory himself who may be reading this, thanks for reading this! Also, I hope you appreciate this as the earnest piece of constructive criticism it is intended to be.

With that out of the way, let’s dive into the tactics.

The 14th hole at LACC is a 612-yard par 5. As he stood on the tee, McIlroy was a 10 under, trailing Wyndham Clark by one shot. Like he did all week, McIlroy absolutely roasted a driver down the left side, 187 mph ball speed on this occasion. His draw got a little heavy, though, and his ball ended in the left rough, 289 yards away from the hole.

NBC

I was actually standing in the rough near McIlroy’s ball as he approached it. I even have photographic evidence. Here I am, frowning.

Richard Heathcote

I got a decent look at the lie and it didn’t strike me as one that was particularly bad or good. Firmly in the medium category.

When McIlroy got to his ball, he took a quick look at his lie then was involved in politely asking the protruding crowd flanking the left side of the hole to move back. “I’ll be going right over your heads,” he said.

The rules officials corralled them back, and it turned into the kind of momentary kerfuffle that happens occasionally in these big groups during majors.

With a lot of external stuff going on, McIlroy and his caddie, Harry Diamond, stepped off the numbers and after a very brief chat, Rory pulled what looked like a high-lofted wedge and nudged it just shy of 170 yards down the hill, into the fairway.

“Smart play Rory,” someone from the crowd shouted.

This is the shot that bothers me though, and the one I can’t stop thinking about. Why didn’t McIlroy try to chase is ball down there a little farther? What was the upside to this conservative route, rather than a more aggressive one, on the final par 5 on the course?

It could’ve been that he wanted a full shot into this green (we’ll get to that), but either way, it struck me as a well-intentioned effort to get back into position, without really exploring if now was the best time to do it.

The fairway itself actually gets slightly wider the farther down it you get, which means there’s not a huge amount of risk in pushing your ball down there farther.

The bunkers themselves aren’t a particularly bad place to be, and if you wanted to play to the green, players had a bail out (and dare I say, back-stopping) option: the 15th tee box flanks the green on the left. Players were bailing out there all week.

The pin itself was tucked more forward on Sunday, too, which means missing left wouldn’t leave you particularly short-sided.

The statistics, seemingly, would support the idea that McIlroy would have been better off to push his ball as far down towards the hole as possible and leave himself with a pitch rather than a full wedge.

On Sunday, 27 players hit their second shots into one of the two zones below. They made 19 pars, five birdies and three bogeys.

Assuming McIlroy took the central route and ended with in the fairway with a shot between 50 and 75 yards, his average proximity from that range would’ve left him an 18-footer for birdie.

Had he found one of the two bunkers, he would have landed himself in a position that he gets himself up-and-down about 50 per cent of the time.

Of all these scenarios, a short left miss would’ve likely left him the most difficult shot, and even that doesn’t seem terrible. McIlroy’s proximity from the rough inside 100 yards this season is a little less than 30 feet. Bryson DeChambeau hit his ball into a spot like this on Sunday. From 50 yards in the rough, he made birdie.

It’s rare that simply being closer to the hole isn’t better than being further away, especially on go-for-the-green opportunities. Frustratingly, McIlroy was a success story of this very approach just the day before. During Saturday’s third round, McIlroy drove his ball into the left rough on this hole. He had a decent-ish lie then, too, so he decided to chop a fairway wood down there, hit a saucy little chip and made birdie.

On Sunday, McIlroy left himself 125 yards for his third. An iffy shot — one of the few McIlroy said after his round he wish he had back:

“As I was walking up to it, it felt like it was a perfect full sand wedge. Hit it hard, get some spin on it. Then while we were getting prepared for the shot, the wind started to freshen a little bit. Full sand wedge wasn’t getting there, so I said to Harry, three-quarter gap wedge would be perfect. I feel like I didn’t time the shot perfectly. I hit it when the wind was at its strongest and the ball just got hit a lot by the wind, and obviously it came up short. If I had it back, I think I had the right club and the right shot. I might have just had to wait an extra 15 or 20 seconds to let that little gust settle.”

Some combination of so-so execution and an unlucky gust left him short and in the lip of a bunker. Things happen in golf, and the further away you are from the hole when it does, the bigger the effects of those unlucky breaks, or slight misses.

David Cannon

McIlroy was actually quite fortunate to get a free drop out of this situation, but it wasn’t enough to save par. Bogey it was, and when Clark made birdie on that hole shortly after, McIlroy was three back with four holes to play. Clark made it interesting with bogeys on two of the final four holes, but another near-miss major it would be for McIlroy.

As the saying goes, hindsight is 20-20. Maybe bogey was just destined to be on that hole no matter what. Maybe it really was a bout of freak bad luck which overshadowed the right play Rory did take. Maybe he would’ve made a worse number if he did go for it.

McIlroy was on the wrong side of professional golf’s thin margins on Sunday regardless. Though the way he’s playing, it won’t be long before he’s on the right side of it.

“When I do finally win this next major, “ he finished his press conference, “it’s going to be really, really sweet.”

The post US Open 2023: Did Rory McIlroy make a lay-up mistake during the final round? appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

During his impressive run in the US Amateur at Ridgewood Country Club last August, Sam Bennett’s play was overshadowed by what was happening before, and after, he struck his shots. For every saucy club twirl, there was a lengthy pre-shot routine that preceded it, the type that turns you from hero into villain on Golf Twitter in record time.

Luckily for Bennett, at the time, his excessive re-gripping and deliberate pre-shot process went undetected by the masses. That’s no longer the case now, as Bennett contended at the Masters in April and briefly this week in the US Open at LACC, the two tournaments with arguably the most eyeballs on them all year.

On Sunday, NBC zeroed in on Bennett for his approach shot at the short par-4 third, where the Texas A&M product had 85 yards left to the hole. For a player of his caliber, a relatively straightforward shot, though you wouldn’t know that by the amount of times he re-gripped his club before taking the club back (it was 10. he did it 10 times):

This is a sick man pic.twitter.com/UdSQv3SuPr

— Dylan (@dylblo) June 18, 2023

Shades of Sergio Garcia in the 2002 US Open at Bethpage Black. Good news for Bennett is, there are no Long Island dads out at LACC heckling him.

In defence of Bennett, he’s been open about his struggles with anxiety on the golf course, saying: “It’s pretty bad. Having anxiety and then getting over a golf ball with all these thoughts in your head, put me in that moment at the US Am with the whole golf world watching, I mean, what can you expect?”

Now just imagine how he must have felt in the hunt at Augusta National, or on Saturday at LACC, when he began the day just five off the lead and wound up shooting a 79.

By the way, Bennett lipped this one out for eagle.

So close!

Sam Bennett nearly holed out for eagle on 3. #USOpen

? @nbc and @peacock pic.twitter.com/xb6qG5hR88

— Golf Channel (@GolfChannel) June 18, 2023

The post US Open 2023: Reigning US Amateur champ Sam Bennett gets flamed on Twitter for 10 (!!) re-grips before approach shot appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.