Is this any way to end?
Old Course's 18th isn't tough on paper, or in nice weather
By Tod Leonard
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
July 17, 2005
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland – Say you are a golf course architect and you go to a client and ask to build an 18th hole just like this:
The fairway will be 100 yards wide with not a blade of rough. There will be no water hazards or bunkers. Make the green so big you could hold a pick-up football game on it. Let's not make it too long either, about 357 yards, and for easy access to the nearby beach, bisect the hole with a road.
Try that and you'd get fired before you ever started.
But on the Old Course, that very blueprint gets you the finishing hole on the oldest course in golf and one of the most revered.
If the Road Hole 17th at St. Andrews is a wake-up call, the 18th is for makeup.
In the 134th British Open this week, it has been a pushover, the easiest hole on the course. Through three rounds, it has surrendered only 11 fewer birdies than pars (179 to 190) and seven eagles. Ten players have birdied it all three days and the stroke average has been 3.55. That's only a quarter of a stroke harder than the fifth hole at Spyglass Hill, played in last year's AT&T, and it's a par-3.
Yesterday in the third round, 42 of the 80 remaining players birdied 18, and two eagled. The top eight players on the leaderboard all made 3.
In a professional era of 500-yard par-4s, some with daunting approaches over water, is this any way to finish a major?
"It's a very, very short hole for a finishing hole, I agree," said reigning U.S. Open champion Michael Campbell. "You can't really miss the fairway because it's so wide. It's quite a weak finishing hole."
Those who would defend the Old Course will tell you it's more about yardage and hazards. On a beautiful afternoon like yesterday, when the sky is so blue and the sun turns golden the face of the Royal and Ancient Clubhouse, who cares how easy it is? Among the most famous courses in the world that host tournaments, probably only Augusta National and Pebble Beach can rival such a stunning conclusion to a day of golf.
No. 18's difficulty, too, is completely dependent on the weather. This week, the wind has mostly been at the players' backs, allowing them to gear down on the tee with 3-woods or something shorter just so they don't hit it over the back and out of bounds.
"It's a great finishing hole," said Tiger Woods. "I've hit driver, 4-iron on that hole before. I played the Dunhill Cup, and I didn't get to the road."
Said Retief Goosen, "I've hit driver, 6-iron on 18 before, when the wind blows the other way. So it just all depends on the weather. And we're fortunate this week it's playing straight downwind."
Unlike some par-4 finishing holes in majors – such as the 18th at Atlanta Athletic Club, where David Toms had to lay up before winning the 2001 PGA – the Old Course's closer more often than not produces exquisite drama.
In 1970, Doug Sanders missed a short putt to fall into a playoff he lost to Jack Nicklaus. In '95, Costantino Rocca rolled in a birdie putt up the mound dubbed the Valley of Sin to get into a playoff he lost to John Daly. On Friday, Jack Nicklaus birdied the last hole of his major career, and Jose Maria Olazabal made eagle to get into the hunt.
Prediction: It won't be any less exciting today.
"Come tomorrow," said Goosen, "when you need a birdie, it's not going to be an easy birdie