SUMMER 2008

What a fabulous month June was for exciting golf.

It started with The Curtis Cup being played at St.Andrews for the first time under a brand new format. Whilst GB&I’s youngest team ever promised much, and no doubt were a very talented group, sadly odd poor shot and missed putt here and there meant that after the first two days the USA lead by 7 ½ points to 4 ½ . There were some outstanding performances from the British team, noteably local girl Krystle Caithness who won all three of the matches which she played, and Sally Watson, who played in all five matches, winning three.

All the attention before the match was on fifteen year old Carly Booth, who became the youngest ever player to represent GB&I. No one will ever know if a strange rash which Carly contracted during the practice rounds took away some of her zip when she played, but Carly’s performance and that of the only previous Curtis Cupper in the GB&I team, Wales’s Breanne Loucks, were disappointing.

The GB&I Captain, Curtis Cup veteran, Mary McKenna was criticised for not putting her best performing players out first, but reagrdless of who played where, GB&I were beaten before the singles started. No team could expect to make up a three point deficit on a very talented U.S team, lead by the outstanding and undefeated Stacy Lewis. In fact since the Curtis Cup, Stacy has turned professional and in her first ever tournament – The U.S.Women’s Open lead after the third round.

Following the matches and GB&I’s resounding defeat, the idea of making The Curtis Europe vs. America once again arose. No doubt everyone involved will have there opinions about whether that should happen, but it seems unlikely to change in the near future.

The next men’s major of the year was the U.S.Men’s Open played at Riviera Country Club in California. All eyes were on the return of Tiger Woods, who hadn’t played since The Masters in April following knee surgery.

The Championship was possibly one of the most dramatic ever. The setting of The Riviera Country Club was wonderful , and with the possibility of rattle snakes in the rough and sheer cliff tops on the edges of some holes, hitting the fairways was more important than ever. No one did that better than England’s Lee Westwood, who played arguably the best golf of anyone for the first three rounds. Tiger's golf wasn't very convincing in virtually every department, but his will to win, ability to produce spectacular shots when they’re most needed and undoubtedly as the best putter in the world, he can win when he’s “playing ugly”. Tiger is a lesson and inspiration to everyone who thinks that you can only score well when playing from the fairway – some of his recoveries make Sevy Ballesteros seem like harry the hacker! When Tiger finished birdie, eagle on Saturday evening to claw his way back into contention, you somehow felt that his name was written on the trophy. Tiger had to work for it though.

Tiger had to work for it though. The final round was played in tricky conditions, with a brisk wind, tough pin placements and greens which were getting firmer by the minute, and a near veteran – Rocco Mediate, playing and looking as though trying to win the U.S. Open was the most enjoyable thing in the world! Rocco was playing in the group ahead of Tiger woods and Lee Westwood, and finished a shot ahead of both Lee and Tiger. The par 5 eighteenth which had been easily reachable during the week, wasn’t on the final day with the wind having switched so that it was into the players. Both Tiger and Lee laid up with their seconds, and needed to make birdies to tie Rocco. Lee’s super fast left to right breaking putt was never strong enough, but Tiger did what he does best and holed his ten foot birdie putt to force an eighteen hole play-off with Rocco Mediate.

The play off was no less dramatic than the 72 holes that went before, with first Tiger surging ahead, and then allowing Rocco back into it with a combination of Tiger’s errors and Rocco’s brilliance. The play-off was finally settled at the first extra hole of a play-off for the play-off, when Rocco hit a poor drive, couldn’t reach the green and bogeyed to Tiger’s par. What drama!

Throughout the Championship Tiger showed signs of struggling with his knee and noticably winced on several occasions. Despite a few players and commentators doubting how bad his knee was,Tiger made the announcement three days after winning this year’s U.s.Open, that he won’t be playing in any tournaments for the rest of the year, and that he would need further surgery to correct his clearly ailing knee. It will be a funny rest of the year without Tiger playing in our Open, The U.S.P.G.a.Championship or The Ryder Cup. We will all be saying so and so won The Open, but of course that was the one that Tiger didn’t play in!

The women’s U.S.Open was played at the magnificent Interlachen course in Minneapolis, which had played host to the 2002 Solheim Cup. After the Taiwanese teeneager Yani Tseng had won the McDonald’s LPGA Championship in her rookie season after defeating Swede Maria Hjorth in a four hole play-off, all eyes were back on Lorena Ochoa and Annika Sorenstam, to see if they could add to their tally of majors.

In the event, Stacy Lewis, the 23 year old American who had played so well in the Curtis Cup a few weeks before stole most of the limelight when she took a one shot lead over Paula Creamer going into the final round. Sadly for American fans, neither stacy nor Paula could produce the goods on a difficult final day. Instead Inbee Park from Korea, who had been in contention all week, played a near flawless final round to win by five shots. It was great to see Sweden’s Helen Alfresson snatch second place by herself by making a birdie on the final hole. I thought that “Alfie” was absolutely brilliant, and hit the ball as well as ever from tee to green, but as usual she struggled holing out on the treacherous greens. I cannot begin to think how much courage Helen must have to keep competing at the very highest level knowing that she has this achilles heel when holing out from a few feet. What an absolutely fantastic result. Stacy Lewis played a super chip at the last to resue her par and for a tie for third. What a dramatic start to her professional career! I’m sure that it won’t be long before she has her first victory on the LPGA Tour.

So we have the Men’s and Women’s British Open’s to look forward to in July, with them being played at Royal Birkdale and Sunningdale respectively. I’m looking forward to them already!