ROCHESTER | At the driving range late Wednesday afternoon, I was yards from Jordan Spieth, one of the best golfers in the world, watching him hit balls with the 8 iron. It was in this spot that any golf enthusiast would linger for hours, wincing and saying a word to reflect on the incredible skills of the players. Minutes earlier, Spieth had responded to a young reporter who wanted to know the score of an average 90 golfer at Oak Hill, and he started laughing.
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The answer ?
“For anyone with a handicap of less than 10 it would be very impressive to hit 100. »
For what ?
“It is very complicated to place and keep the ball in the aisles. If it’s not there, you have to get it out by practically shoveling the tall grass to put it back in the driveway. And the work is not finished until the pennant. »
His words are those of a three-time Grand Slam champion with 13 wins in his professional career.
Corey Conners’ caddy, Danny Sahl, chimed in when I asked him Friday morning. He would see a good golfer approaching 105 or 110 shots.
Photo François-David Rouleau
Dozens of golfers played on the putting green at Oak Hill Golf Club before the first round of the PGA Championship.
When Spieth thinks the job of getting out of awkward positions isn’t done, he’s only scratching the surface. For Oak Hill, there are seven par 4s over 450 yards, two par 5s over 600 yards and two par 3s over 220 yards.
It does not remind of the location of the threatening and deep bunkers and protects both the fairways and the greens. Not even the bumps that fool the eye and require accurate distance calculations. Neither does the speed of the green surface. Not even the weather conditions that disrupt the game: the wind direction, the gusts and the rain.
Photo: AFP
Dustin Johnson covered the second hole with sand during a practice round earlier this week.
In short, while Oak Hill is great in these championship conditions, it would cap the average amateur hitting the “little white” with a beautiful Sunday stroll.
Pure excellence
It is fair to write that the courses of the major championships are difficult and enumerate data series to support the arguments… The pictures on TV do not do justice to the complexity, the intricacies and the level of difficulty of these monstrous courses of play.
As a testament to this, those living the dream of stepping onto Augusta National’s hallowed ground during the Masters tournament are awed by the course’s climbs and demanding march. We repeat it every year, the 11th’s ramp slopes to the left almost like the curve of an oval on a stock car track. You have to be there to experience it.
Brutal 7,400-yard beasts whose fairways are lined with four inches of thick grass that would make any psycho gardener, myself included, envious are not out front.
Photo François-David Rouleau
Behind the ninth flag at Oak Hill Golf Club to mark the PGA Championship, all that can be seen is the cap of the ball, buried in the four inch grass at the edge of the green.
One has to go there to discover the magnitude of the event and to admire how these 150 or so golfers excel in their field. Since there are no golf courses like Oak Hill, Southern Hills, Bethpage Black, Winged Foot, Pebble Beach, Oakmont, Portrush and Co. in Quebec. There are a handful across Canada. We certainly have beautiful golf courses, but none can compare to these places that host the world’s greatest golf tournaments.
Next year, the Royal Montreal will host the Presidents Cup for the second time in its rich history. The club has been remodeled several times to accommodate the tens of thousands of visitors and offer a test worthy of the world’s finest in golf. In terms of plans, nothing compares to the 2007 edition as the event has grown over the years. The organization approaches that of the major championships.
logistical challenge
From his living room you can’t tell the magnitude of major golf events. You have to see it to believe it. Thousands of employees and 5,000 volunteers cavort behind the scenes.
A network of almost 300 buses and shuttles is required from the car parks with almost 20,000 parking spaces to the site. In addition to 300,000 cans of beer, more than 150,000 pounds of hot dogs and hamburgers will be distributed in the concessions at the four corners of the route.
Over the course of the 18th century, nearly 3,000 people were seated in the thirty or so company boxes, each costing tens of thousands of dollars.
Courtesy of the PGA of America
On the way to the 18th Pennant in Oak Hill, about 3,000 people crowded the approximately 30 company boxes along the driveway.
And the size of the massive merchandise pavilion, which fills up throughout the day, can make a Wal-Mart blush.
These events are prepared years in advance. During the Ryder Cup in Whistling Straits in September 2021, John Denver, a PGA of America executive who was then working for the Expos, told me his team had been busy for months organizing this edition of the championship in Rochester.
A similar golf tournament poses a major logistical challenge that cannot be mastered with more than 40,000 spectators passing through the turnstiles every day. Once they get close to the site, everything has to be calculated to the quarter turn.
During the 2021 Ryder Cup in Whistling Straits, crowds of about 50,000 viewers a day had completely overwhelmed the network of Sheboygan, a small and quiet Wisconsin town nestled between farmland and Lake Michigan. The transport plan had failed completely.
The atmosphere all about the best
The imposing crowd carried by the stars is also impressive. Obviously Tiger Woods is in a class by himself. It’s insane to see him perform even once on the ropes from the fifth row. Luckily, journalists other than Augusta also have access inside the ropes to follow the game.
AFP
Huge crowds follow Tiger Woods to every tournament the superstar participates in. The rows of spectators line up along the ropes.
I remember getting stuck in a huge funnel on my way from the third green to the fourth tee at the 2019 US Open in Pebble Beach. It took me a good half hour to get out.
Jordan Spieth, Justin Thomas and Rory McIlroy are obviously others who are very popular with viewers.
The rush to see them in action can annoy less patient playmates, especially in the United States. Spectators don’t respect golf etiquette as much as they do in Europe. They move, talk, and make noise despite repeated instructions to remain still.
At the British Open you can almost hear a pin drop when a golfer wants to play.
And what about Augusta’s rule that bans cell phones on property? This is a rule that does not comply with the reality of our time, but allows you to fully enjoy the precious moments of this mythical route. The “bosses” there are generally more civilized than at the US Open, the PGA of America Championship and other tournaments.
At the other end of the spectrum are the two team competitions, the Ryder Cup and the Presidents Cup. The electric atmosphere is intoxicating. The spectators are dressed in the colors of their favourites. They shout, they sing, they hurl insults. comedies and less comics. It’s part of the show that makes the tournament so special. Like everywhere.