Recent win means golf’s a whole new ball game for Parry

CRAIG PARRY was one of the earliest arrivals at Mount Juliet for this week’s American Express World Golf Championship. He arrived straight from his home in Sydney where he had been celebrating his victory in the NEC Invitational World Championship last month in Seattle.

Parry isn’t promising himself or indeed his brother and caddy Glenn he can beat the odds once again. But he acknowledges that his NEC triumph has imbued a new level of confidence that was conspicuously absent through most of a season which saw him run up a succession of missed cuts.

It’s a whole new ball game now and the burly 5ft 6inch Aussie, who divides his time between homes in Sydney and Orlando, commands a respect from his peers that wasn’t necessarily there prior to his exploits at the Sahalee club.

“I had a week of partying and interviews in Sydney before getting back on the golf scene with a bit of practice last week,” he said. “The partying wasn’t out of control, there were a couple of nights when we had a few friends over and had a few beers and some food and that was about it.”

Parry had just completed nine holes at Mount Juliet when I caught up with him yesterday and he was loud in his praise of the condition of a course he remembers from playing here in the 1993 Carrolls Irish Open.

“I played the front nine and I have to say it was fantastic,” he enthused. “The course is in great shape. The last time I was here, it was different because it was very wet. The greens out there are perfect. The bunkers, the fairways, everything is really good.”

“As a rule, I like a few of Jack Nicklaus’s courses and there are some I don’t, but the good ones are very good. Mount Juliet is very similar to the Australian Golf Club. Kerry Packer is a member there and he got Jack to come in and redesign it and we’ve had a few Australian Opens there. It’s one of our better courses.”

Parry, 36, is no stranger to Ireland even though he has been plying his trade on the US Tour since 1992. Prior to that he was a regular on the European circuit and in 1989 captured the German Open and the Wang Four Stars pro celebrity.

He has particularly fond memories of Portmarnock (“a great golf course”) and Killarney (“I thought that was really good, on the lake, very pretty”) and has news for several of the American players coming here this week.

“The crowds are going to be huge this week and they just love their golf,” he declared. “They are very appreciative and I don’t think the American players realise how much the spectators get behind the golfers here. A lot of the guys wouldn’t have been to Ireland and played an Irish Open. I always enjoyed going to Scotland for the British Open and the crowds this week are going to be right up there with that and bigger than a Scottish Open. You’ve got plenty of room for the galleries here.”

Parry, known as Popeye because of the amazing strength of his forearms, had no hesitation in using his driver off every par four or five tee, even the fourth which for ordinary mortals appears to be a very tight drive.

“I prefer to come in there with a wedge rather than a medium iron because of the water to the right and back of the green,” he reasoned. “The longest iron I hit into any of the par fours was a four iron to the ninth.

“I understand the weather forecast is favourable and that could mean low scoring. But I doubt it. The greens are firm and that’s going to dictate everything. You won’t get close to some of the pin positions so I don’t see it getting too low. 15 under? I think that would be a very good score. They’ll tuck the flags behind bunkers or water and you’ll be putting from 30, 40 feet away, and that’s after a good shot.”

Parry in is no doubt the later arrivals are going to enjoy the lay out enormously. “Any time you get a good course with fantastic greens to putt on, you’re going to be happy,” he said. “These greens are as good as any I have putted on in Europe as far as the ball rolling really pure is concerned.

“Jack’s (Nicklaus’s) course at Muirfield, the greens there are fantastic, probably the best you’ll putt on anywhere. Japan has good greens and we’ve got good greens in Australia and these at Mount Juliet are right up there.

“I understand the course superintendent (Aidan O’Hara) worked at Muirfield and the way the course is set up here, there are a lot of similarities.

“The way the sand starts in the bunkering, the greens, there are a lot of similarities and it’s right up there with Muirfield.”

This is Parry’s first competitive outing since the NEC and he insists: “I’m not expecting too much. Sahalee was a course I felt I could play well on. It suited my game as far as hitting irons off the tee and positioning your ball were concerned. You couldn’t get up and hit driver everywhere, you had to think your way around the course.

“Here, I’ll be able to hit driver most of the time, I don’t see any reason to reach for the two iron very often.”