Brennan's Blog - British Open Championship

I had mentioned in last week's blog for the AT&T National that we were paired with Randel El and Jason Campbell during the Wednesday Pro-am.  During the Pro-Am I got to meet Shaun Suisham who is from Ontario and happens to be the place kicker for the Redskins.  On Sunday after the round Shaun invited me and the family to Redskin Park where they call home.  It was a nice facility with several practice fields and a great locker room with gym, training room, and all sorts of stuff.  Being a lifelong Skins fan it was great to get to see the facility and see the three SuperBowl trophies in the large case!  I don't get too excited about seeing many locker rooms but this one was a highlight for me!  Shaun was a great guy and it's great to see some more Canadians in the NFL!
 
After the long journey to Scotland we have had a few good days here at Turnberry.  Four years ago when you use to come over the week before and play some golf for fun, we spent a few days playing here and I really love it. 

This is by far my favourite course in the rotation with the main reason being that there are not many blind shots.  The one thing that makes links courses very tough and tricky are the blind shots especially off of the tees.  They like to lower the tee boxes and let the fescue grow quite high in front of the teeing area so you can see where you are going.  Not the case here as there are only a few shots like that and the course is very fair.

For those who don't know, this is not my favorite place in the world as accommodations are very difficult to find and the food isn't exactly what we are use to at home.  The town, or shall I say the two block village, consists of the golf course, the beautiful hotel, and a few condos which we are fortunate enough to stay in.  Aside from that there is nothing around!  Mike was gracious enough to let me stay with him this week and I feel fortunate as most caddies are 20 minutes down the road in sub-par accommodations.  A few are staying in a local trailer park, 1200 pounds for the week! $2000 Canadian for 7 nights is not exactly a good deal.

IMG who manages a lot of golfers on the PGA Tour have one of the houses in town, and that is where we eat every night.  They have a great hospitality area and do a phenomenal job looking after us this week. There is not a lot going on here so the day consists of going to the golf course, back to get cleaned up, and then to the IMG house.  It is pretty boring but without a car there is not a lot of excitement.

The course itself last held the Open Championship as they like to call it, they don't like the British Open as this is the original Open Championship and that is what they call it.  In 1994, Nick Price beat Jesper Parnivik to win in a dramatic finish.

The course has since been lenghtened and the rough is much tougher than last time.  I wouldn't call it an overly long course, but you have to get the ball in the fairway if you are going to score well.  You will have guys hitting all kinds of hybrids and fairway woods off the tees as you have to place the ball away from the fairway bunkers.  Like most links style courses it is a penalty shot each time you hit it in them.
 
On Sunday Mike and I met up here in town and went out later on in the day and walked the golf course. 
He just took a putter and we walked around to get a feel for the course and worked on a game plan for the tournament.  It is a great way to get a feel for the course and work on his putting on the greens. 

On Monday we played 18 holes with Rod Pampling, always a good guy to play practice rounds with.  On Tuesday we played 9 holes with Camilo Villegas and an Englishman Robert Rock. The pace of play was so slow that we played holes 1 to 7 and then cut over to play the final few holes.

The weather has been pretty good so far this week.  Good for Scotland I should say, but not for the middle of summer with 15 degree weather and occasional showers. When it gets to 18 and sunny everyone thinks there is a heat wave! Not exactly where I would come for a beach holiday!
 
After the tournament on Sunday there is a charter flight heading back to Toronto for the RBC Canadian Open.  On Monday Mike is hosting the Mike Weir Charity Classic at Glen Abbey and I got invited to play by Geoff Beattie from Thomson Reuters.  Should be a fun day!  The celebrity field is going to be great and I would encourage everyone to come and help us all raise a lot of money for the kids!