Sitting in the grandstands at The Open can be great fun, but are the queues worth the wait? Steve Carroll and Matt Chivers discuss the pros and cons of queueing for the best seats in the house
There are a number of tactics you can deploy as a spectator at The Open. You can follow your favourite players over the humps and dunes of Royal Liverpool Golf Club, or plant yourself in a grandstand and watch the waves pass through.
If you choose the latter, there are both pros and cons – but which outweighs the other? The queue for a seat can be excruciating, but you’re rewarded with a position A view at the players.
The team at NCG has clashed on this subject throughout Open week, so we’ve put the debate into words:
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Should you queue for a grandstand at The Open?
Plant yourself in a grandstand and enjoy The Open!
It may feel like a long time when you’re in the queue, but sitting in an Open grandstand and setting up camp for an hour or so is great fun, writes Matt Chivers.
The Open grandstand tickets aren’t a concept that exists either, so it will add no cost or expense to enhance your view on golf’s best tournament.
Especially if you choose the right one. If I were you, I’d head to the grandstand behind the 8th green at Hoylake, which also gives you a view of the 9th tee box – a par 3.
Try to sit as high as possible too. You can peer down upon your favourite players and have a view people watching at home can’t see.
If you think strategically about queuing, you can get around the delays. Get a few holes ahead of the player you’re searching for, and get locked in. Open grandstands offer the best seats in the house.
I get it. When you’re stuck in a long line of golf fans, you get feverish to actually see some golf. Rory McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler could be over your shoulder, but you’re standing looking at a set of stairs.
But you’ll be rewarded for your patience and you’ll be the envy of your fellow spectators once you’re looking down on them in the raised seats.
Why would you waste your precious time standing in a line?
There’s something peculiarly British about spending time standing around in a line, writes Steve Carroll. It’s a big golf course out there. Don’t waste your time queuing up. Get out there. Explore it. Enjoy it.
I was watching one human centipede trail its way out of the back of one big Hoylake construction. All they could see was the rear of the stand and it looked like it was quite the wait.
But no more than 20 seconds walk away was a green with no one standing around it. Except for me, anyway. They could have sat down, practically unwrapped a picnic, and watched the world’s best go by. They had so much room.
It’s three figures to get a ticket. I know it’s a long day. And I know it’s hard to stay on your feet for 12 hours. But I’ll never understand the obsession with seeing a line and being determined to attach yourself to it.
If I see a queue, I walk right on by. Time is precious. There’s plenty to do at The Open without spending that time staring at the back of someone’s head.
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