He was 11 shots worse coming home.
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“Obviously (finishing low amateur) would be brilliant”, Dunne conceded.
With temperatures in the mid-50s and little wind to speak of on a cloudy morning along St. Andrews Bay, the early starters should be able to put up some impressive scores. It would be something I would remember forever. One of his followers drew Lawrie’s attention to a golf magazine’s preview for the tournament that included a slur about him winning at Carnoustie in 1999. You come here to try to do your best, but these guys play every day of the week and it’s a tough golf course.
Lawrie, playing with Americans Ryan Palmer and Kevin Kisner, took almost five hours to complete his round due to slow play and the amount of double greens on the Old Course.
The weather is expected to turn foul over the next few days and Lawrie isn’t particularly looking forward to it.
The 27-year-old Swede, who won his first PGA Tour title last month by beating England’s Justin Rose in a play-off at the Memorial Tournament, raced to five under after just six holes having begun his round with four successive birdies. Previous year (he missed the cut at Hoylake) I was a bit overwhelmed and more worried about who I was playing with.
Lawrie was two shots off the lead at the halfway-stage when weather disrupted the 2015 Open at St Andrews.
“Obviously I’ve been working really hard on my putting”.
“All I’m thinking about is getting off the first tee tomorrow, picking my line that I want to hit it on, making a good swing, and moving on to the second shot at the first”.
Bjorn, another Scandinavian and twice an Open runner-up, soon joined Lingmerth after picking up four shots between the fourth and eighth in an outward nine of 32. So much so, that spectators shouted “Smile!” at him as he trudged around the Gullane links at the Scottish Open last week.
“I’m not going to say I’m going to play better (this time)”. I went out with a number in my head trying to shoot 68 so I came up just short, but I’m pretty pleased with a 69.
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With what exactly? The St Andrews bunkers, for example. At least, they did the right thing thereafter by not rushing to get the action under way action, frustrating as though it may have been for thousands of spectators as Mother Nature took revenge on the event’s organisers for pulling a fast one by introducing a two-tee start for the first time in the event’s history on the same day past year and getting play finished before an almighty deluge hit Royal Liverpool.
