The US Open returns to the No.2 Course at Pinehurst for the fourth time in its history from June 13-16, but who will rise to the occasion at the Cradle of American Golf to claim this year’s penultimate major championship
While it has been a decade since the US Open was last held at Pinehurst’s famous No.2 course – when Martin Kaymer laid waste to the field with an eight-shot win – golf fans should be prepared to get to know every blade of its 7,500-plus yards in the years to come following the USGA’s decision to host no fewer than five future US Opens at the North Carolina venue over the next 23 years. One of the USGA’s new ‘anchor sites’, Pinehurst will be popping up on our screens every five or six years between now and 2047, giving Donald Ross’s masterpiece plenty of airtime and the new generation of golfers plenty of opportunities to get to grips with the nuances of this sand-strewn course with its upturned saucers for greens.
THE TOUGHEST TEST
The US Open is known for being the toughest test in golf, with long courses, narrow fairways, and heavy rough, but the challenge posed to players at this year’s championship will be slightly different. Originally designed by Ross in 1907, Pinehurst’s No.2 received a major overhaul in 2012, with Bill Coore and two-time Masters champion Ben Crenshaw restoring many of Ross’s features by widening the fairways, removing 35 acres of maintained Bermuda grass rough, turning off peripheral irrigation that spilled out into the rough, and planting hundreds of thousands of wiregrass plants, while creating uneven native areas flanking the fairways. The result is unevenness and unpredictability in these unmanaged areas, with the ball likely to come to rest in places that could be either quite easy or very hard to get back into play, as we witnessed when Kaymer et al were in action in 2014.
BUNKER DEBATE
With formal bunkers intertwined among a wide area of broken sandy ground, each group of players will be accompanied by a rules official whose task it will be to declare the ball either in or out of the bunker – with the rules pertaining to each status made clear. In some cases, that will not be a straightforward decision. USGA officials have made it clear that if there is any doubt, referees will tip the balance towards declaring the ball in a hazard, so that players can be careful not to ground their club. There will be a lot of tee shots that run off the fairway and into more tricky territory, which will require players to show patience and accuracy in equal measure, so expect to see a few unhappy golfers and a few big scores.
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