Shane Lowry takes the rough with the smooth
And as he looked forward to a potentially career-defining day at the US Open, the Irishman starting his final round just three shots off the lead in a wide-open race for the second major championship title of the season, there was no way he was about to start criticising the tournament organisers for the way they had presented this year’s course.
When Lowry (28), sees a course he likes it is a good sign the world number 57 is in good week. Such as at Baltray six years ago when he announced his presence on the scene by winning the Irish Open as an amateur. Or at Wentworth where the Clara, Co Offaly, native racked up another top-10 finish in the BMW PGA Championship last month.
And so it has been here at a linksy layout overlooking the saltwater Pacific Ocean inlet of Puget Sound. Positive first impressions on arrival last Monday have led to Lowry becoming one of only four players to have posted three rounds of par or better over the first 54 holes, the others being two of the final-day quartet of co-leaders Jason Day and Branden Grace as well as Cameron Smith, the Australian who started the final round level with Lowry at one under in another group of four.
Nowhere does being comfortable in one’s surroundings matter more than at a US Open, which tests a golfer’s attitude, emotional control and patience as much as his skill set for the game.
And three days in, Lowry, no stranger to combustibility, had passed golf’s toughest examination.
More remarkably, he had done so having ignored the warnings of the USGA’s executive director Mike Davis, the man in charge of US Open course set-up who annoyed many of the Irishman’s fellow pros by telling them that a homework assignment on Chambers Bay was a prerequisite to success.
“I would contend that there is no way — no way — a player would have success here at Chambers Bay unless he really studies the golf course and learns it,” Davis had said a few weeks out from the championship. “The idea of coming in and playing two practice rounds and having your caddie just walk it and using your yardage book, that person’s done (and) will not win the US Open.”
Lowry was last night aiming to prove Davis wrong. He had not fallen into the trap of criticising the USGA man for his comments and had refused to form a judgement on the course before he had seen it with his own eyes.
“I arrived here on Monday, played 36 holes practice. I think that was the one of the things Mike Davis said we weren’t going to be able to do,” Lowry said following a third-round, level-par 70 that had put him within touching distance of a maiden major championship win.
“Hopefully I’ll prove him wrong. I played 18 holes Monday, nine Tuesday, and nine Wednesday. That’s what I normally do. You go to Augusta, Augusta is probably one of the hardest golf courses to learn quickly and people go and do it. This is quite similar. It’s quite tough to learn how to play it. But most of the shots are there in front of you. You’ve got your yardage book, you’ve got a caddie that should know, most people do anyway, you know how far you hit the ball most of the time. And you just go with that and see what happens.”
Being armed with advance intelligence has clearly been no guarantee of success around Chambers Bay this week. World number 32 Ryan Moore is from Tacoma, the city just north of the public course and he missed the cut. Phil Mickelson made a scouting trip and sought out a local caddie for advice and will have to wait another year to come close to achieving his career Grand Slam.
Lowry is happy to play the cards as he is dealt them and displayed the ability not to come into the Chambers Bay with any preconceived notions about the course.
“I like coming to golf courses that nobody has played it. Everyone is on an even keel at the start of the week and you play it from there.
“I think about three or four months ago or a couple of months ago anyway, a couple of guys came up and played here, and then I saw a few comments on Twitter from a few people. Talking about the golf course before you get here is not necessarily the right thing to do.
“You want to get here and see it and see how it plays. When I got here on Monday I thought, yeah, it’s a bit funky, like the first if you miss it left. But the more you play it, the more it grows on you and that’s what I felt. And that was one of the reasons I think I’m in the position I’m in today.”
And while some, such as Henrik Stenson and Rory McIlroy, have got into a debate about whether the putting surfaces most resemble broccoli or cauliflower and others have simply called them bad, Lowry described the course as difficult but fair.
“It’s tough. It’s very tough. But I think it’s playable. I think it’s been getting a lot of slack. The greens are not the best surfaces, but if you hit a good putt nine times out of 10 it goes in. Sometimes you hit a good putt and it misses. That’s the thing a lot of players are focusing on.
“It’s very tough. It’s tough to hit greens. But at the end of the day it’s a US Open. Like, the leader is four under. A US Open is not normally like that. I don’t know what was in the top 10 last year at Pinehurst, but in my opinion, Pinehurst is on a similar scale to this, and hard, as well.
“If you miss the green at Pinehurst you couldn’t chip. You’re supposed to be able to chip with the grain on the grass. I think that was a little more unfair than this is. So, yeah, I think the course, fair enough, the greens are not a 100%, but the golf course is still a good golf course.”
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