‘I couldn’t face hitting a putt – then I won The Open’
“On the Wednesday afternoon I met with Dr Bob Rotella who I have worked with on and off with for years. He got me hitting putts with my lob wedge, just blading it, and a few balls started going in the hole.
“One of his drills is the less you try, the more you get. If you putt with your lob wedge you don’t expect to hole much and it helped with getting some feel. We tend to get very tentative and steer the putter and, with a lob wedge, you have to release it.
“On Thursday I hit a soft draw to 20 feet, left the putt two-and-a-half feet short and missed but I stuck with it. I finished 28th on putting that week so I won with my ball striking but putted half decent.
“On the Saturday night I got nine-and-a-half hours of solid sleep and opened the curtains to see it was grey, there was a bit of rain, and it was blowing 20 miles-per-hour. And I thought, ‘Perfect’.”
On Royal Portush hosting the 2019 Open…
“Portrush is going to be unbelievable. It’s as good a course as you will play anywhere, and as fair a links as anywhere in the world.
“If you were to ask any tour pro their favourite Open venue, take St Andrews out of it as it’s the Home of Golf, then 99% will say Royal Birkdale. Poll them after next July and a high percentage will now say Portrush. It is sensational.
“It’s a Harry Colt course and he’s the best of the best. The R&A came in and had a good look and decided it would need some modernisation so their course designer Martin Ebert came over and took a look. We jumped in my cart one January afternoon and he has made an already brilliant course even better.
It would have been great but now it will be unbelievable. The pictures will be incredible. I never would have believed you if you had said 30 years ago, with everything going on at the time, that The Open would be played here and it makes us all so proud.”
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Darren Clarke was speaking to NCG as an ambassador for Loch Lomond Whiskies. Clarke will help create The Open Course Collection: Royal Portrush Edition which will be a 19-year old Single Malt and will go on sale in early 2019. Visit Loch Lomond Whiskies’ website for more information.
Mark Townsend
Been watching and playing golf since the early 80s and generally still stuck in this period. Huge fan of all things Robert Rock, less so white belts. Handicap of 8, fragile mind and short game
