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    The British Open Is Special to Tom Watson. He’s Won It Five Times.

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    He talks about landing his first major at the event 50 years ago.A half century has passed since Tom Watson captured the first of his five British Opens, defeating Jack Newton by one in an 18-hole playoff at Carnoustie Golf Links in Scotland.Watson’s most memorable Open triumph, however, came in 1977 at Turnberry in Scotland when he closed with a 65 to edge Jack Nicklaus by a stroke in what became known as the Duel in the Sun. Turnberry was also the venue for one of Watson’s toughest losses. In the 2009 British Open, Watson led by one on the final hole but made a bogey and fell to Stewart Cink in a four-hole playoff.With this year’s Open starting Thursday at Royal Portrush Golf Club in Northern Ireland, Watson, 75, reflected on his past appearances.The following conversation has been edited and condensed.What stands out about your British Open win in 1975?What stands out is when I was receiving the trophy from the captain of the R&A, he said to the crowd, “Now I’d like to introduce as the champion golfer of the year, Tom Kite.” That’s how unknown I was.What did the victory do for your confidence?It was obviously a victory in a very important tournament, but I was still trying to learn how to win. I hadn’t learned how yet. I felt I had the tools to win, but I didn’t perform when the chips were down. A lot of it has to do with trusting your golf swing, but it also had to do with swinging too fast and making quick decisions. I finally learned by walking a beat slower and deep breathing coupled with a trust in your golf swing. Things started to fall into place.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      British Open: A Royal Course Prepares to Star Again

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      The town of Portrush in Northern Ireland will host the event for the first time since 2019.Driving into the town of Portrush, host of this week’s Open Championship, you’re greeted by a mural on the entire wall of a house that features two things: a smiling cherubic face — albeit one with a bright, ginger beard — and the claret jug, one of the oldest trophies in golf.The jug goes to the winner of the Open Championship, who is otherwise known as the champion golfer of the year. The face belongs to Shane Lowry, who won the Open in 2019, the last time it was played in Portrush, a seaside town in County Antrim, Northern Ireland.What that mural captures is more than a victory. It captures elation. It was the first time the Open Championship, also known as the British Open, had been played in Northern Ireland since 1951, when the English golfer Max Faulkner won it. In 2019, Lowry was a native son who led the tournament for the final three rounds, prevailing on a misty Sunday evening over Tommy Fleetwood, from England, who finished six shots back.Lowry, who grew up in Clara, in the Republic of Ireland, was then dividing time between Dublin and Jupiter, Fla. He was already established as a formidable golfer in Ireland and Europe. As an amateur, he won the Irish Open in 2009; it was the first event he played on the European Tour (now the DP World Tour) and it started his professional career.A decade on, his victory in Portrush did more than just add another great Irish golfer to the list of Open champions, which include Rory McIlroy, Padraig Harrington, and Darren Clarke. His win shined a light on a town and a region that an international sporting audience had not seen on such a grand stage.At the heart of Portrush is the area around the harbor.Portrush is a seaside town in County Antrim, Northern Ireland.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The L.P.G.A. Is Getting a New Commissioner. He’s Got Some Work to Do.

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      Craig Kessler starts in a few days and knows what he must do to help the tour grow.Women’s golf has been riding a wave of increased popularity over the past five years.At the professional level, golf has a young generation of stars like Nelly Korda, Charley Hull, Minjee Lee and Rose Zhang, who are keeping fans engaged and who are expected to play in this week’s Amundi Evian Championship.Korda, in winning five tournaments in a row last year, transcended golf to become part of the broader sports conversation for her feat.Among amateurs, girls and young women are the fastest growing contingent of golfers. A third of junior golfers are girls — the highest percentage ever — and the number of female golfers has grown by 41 percent since 2019, according to the National Golf Foundation.But unlike the organizations behind women’s soccer or basketball, the largest professional organization behind women’s golf, the L.P.G.A., which runs the L.P.G.A. Tour, has struggled to capitalize on interest in the sport and the star power of its players.Craig Kessler, the L.P.G.A.’s incoming commissioner, said that his goal was to nurture emotional investment among fans.Sam Hodde/Getty ImagesThe league’s newly appointed commissioner, Craig Kessler, who starts on Tuesday, knows that leveraging this interest in the women’s game to create momentum is his remit. He does not shy away from the challenges.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      The Evian Championship Has Produced a Lot of Drama

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      Here are a handful of exciting tournaments from 2004 to 2022.The Amundi Evian Championship, which begins Thursday at the Evian Resort Golf Club in France, has produced its share of drama since Helen Alfredsson of Sweden captured the first tournament in 1994.The event, a major on the L.P.G.A. Tour since 2013, has been held 30 times. In half of those occasions, the winner won by a stroke or in a sudden-death playoff, including five times since 2017.Following are five tournaments that stand out.2004Early in the final round, Wendy Doolan trailed Annika Sorenstam, a Hall of Famer, by six strokes. Game, set and …Not match.During a five-hole stretch (holes six through 10), Doolan of Australia, notched three birdies and two eagles. The eagle came on No. 7, a par five, when she hit her second shot to within two feet and knocked in the putt.With three holes to go, she was up by three and wound up winning by one.“That’s a lot of birdies and eagles right there,” she said after clinching the victory. “I’m going to cherish this because I wouldn’t be surprised if it never happens again.”“I just knew I had it in me to make a lot of birdies on this course,” she added. “This means what I’m doing is working for me.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Annika Sorenstam Reflects on a Super Competitive Career

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      She won the Evian Championship in 2000 and 2002 and reflects on a career in which she was super competitive.The past winners of the Amundi Evian Championship, which begins on Thursday in France, include some of the game’s brightest stars, such as Sweden’s Annika Sorenstam, who prevailed in 2000 and 2002.Among women golfers, only Patty Berg, Mickey Wright and Louise Suggs captured more majors than Sorenstam, who won 10. Sorenstam, with 72 victories overall, is also known for her 2003 appearance in the Colonial, a men’s tournament — she missed the cut — and being the lone woman to record a round under 60. In 2001, she shot a 59 at an event in Arizona.Sorenstam, 54, reflected recently on her career. The following conversation has been edited and condensed.The Evian wasn’t a major when you won, but did you approach it as one?For us Europeans, it was prestigious. It had such a different atmosphere compared to all the other tournaments in Europe, one you wanted to win.What do you recall about the victory at the Evian over Karrie Webb in 2000?My biggest rival was Karrie, so I could not have asked for a better showdown at the premier event in Europe, to have a chance to beat Karrie at her best. The 18th hole is a fun finishing hole — challenging, but it can be super rewarding. No laying up. You got to go for it. I put the pedal to the metal. I felt good all weekend.Sorenstam, with 72 victories overall, is also known for her 2003 appearance in the Colonial, a men’s tournament, and being the lone woman to record a round under 60.Andrew Redington/Allsport, via Getty ImagesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S. Open: With 15,000 Fewer Trees, Oakmont Is Now Ready for Another Major

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      A former club president, known as Old Chainsaw, started the process in 1994 under cover of darkness. It transformed play.Standing on the back porch at Oakmont Country Club, site of the U.S. Open, which begins on Thursday, you can see 16 of the 18 greens. This is something that was not possible and was downright undesirable when the club hosted the Open in 1994.At that Open, Oakmont, considered then and now to be among the toughest tests of golf in America, looked like a forest, with trees lining the fairways. The club also had hundreds of bunkers, meaning an errant shot would be punished by a tree or a bunker — or in some cases, both.The course, near Pittsburgh, that will be on view this week began its transformation under cover of darkness after that Open and culminated in 2023 with Gil Hanse restoring it to the original vision of Henry Fownes, the club’s founder and principal architect.As strange as it may sound today, those trees began to fall at the hands of members cutting during the night.“Absolutely true,” said Bob Ford, once the longtime head pro who used to live in a house adjacent to the 18th green. “They went out at 4:30 in the morning with lights. My wife would wake up to the sounds of the chain saws, and I’d say, ‘Banks is at it again.’”Banks was R. Banks Smith, a corporate lawyer and the president of Oakmont at the time. Known as Old Chainsaw, Smith was the leader of the tree removal project that largely went undetected for years.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S. Open: At Oakmont, a Rare Changing of the Guard

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      Devin Gee, who look over from the longtime club pro, Bob Ford, a few years ago, is working his first Open as pro.Devin Gee is ready for this U.S. Open.His mentor and former boss, Bob Ford, will be standing on the first tee at Oakmont Country Club as he has for the last five U.S. Opens at the club near Pittsburgh. But he will be there in a new role as the starter, reading the names of the players. It will be the first time in over four decades that Ford has not been the head pro at the club for the Open.That role is now held by Gee, who is at Oakmont only because a friend convinced him to take a summer internship in 2006.“I was supposed to go to Medinah that year,” Gee said of the golf club near Chicago. “But some circumstances took me here.”And now he is set to be the face of Oakmont as it hosts a record 10th U.S. Open. “It’s a dream job,” he said. “It’s a prominent place. As you can imagine, anyone going into a job like this, you wonder, am I ready for it?”As at many U.S. Open venues, the head pro job at Oakmont comes open infrequently and is coveted when it does. Winged Foot Golf Club in New York, another anchor site for the United States Golf Association, is only on its seventh head pro in 102 years. The longest tenure went to Claude Harmon, the Masters champion who was there for 31 years.Brendan Walsh is set to become the pro emeritus at the Country Club in Brookline, Mass., after 27 years. His predecessor, Don Callahan, was in that role from 1967 to 1999, with the last several years as pro emeritus.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      U.S. Open: In 1983, Larry Nelson Conquered Oakmont

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      He won the U.S. Open on the course where this year’s tournament is being held.​​Ronald Reagan was president and “Flashdance … What a Feeling” topped the charts in June 1983 when Larry Nelson won the U.S. Open at Oakmont Country Club just outside Pittsburgh, the site of the national championship, which begins on Thursday. Nelson defeated Tom Watson by a stroke to clinch the second of his three major titles.The two were tied when play in the final round was suspended because of rain with a few holes to play. The next morning, Nelson, who is now 77, made a 62-footer on No. 16 to seize a lead he didn’t relinquish.Nelson, who served in Vietnam and didn’t pick up the game until he was 21, recently spoke about the week at Oakmont.This conversation has been edited and condensed.Is Oakmont the toughest course on the planet?It can be, depending on the way that it is set up. The Open in 1983 was one of the toughest I ever played.How were you feeling going into the week?The year had not been all that good, even though it felt like I was playing pretty good. A lot of things happened the week of the Open. As a matter of fact, my family and I flew up on Monday, but my clubs didn’t get there until Tuesday afternoon. Probably the best thing that could have happened, because I spent a lot of time putting. Anyway, I felt like I was as ready as I could possibly be on Thursday and got off to kind of a rough start.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      P.G.A. Championship: An Intimate Look at Quail Hollow

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      The pro Webb Simpson lives near the seventh hole and knows the ins and outs of the course where the P.G.A. Championship will be played.Webb Simpson has what many recreational golfers dream of.Simpson — who won the U.S. Open in 2012 and Players Championship in 2018, and has played on multiple Ryder and Presidents Cup squads — can walk out his back door and be on the seventh hole of the Quail Hollow Club, the host of this week’s P.G.A. Championship and an annual tour stop on the PGA Tour.Better still, Simpson, who has five children, can hop in his golf cart like any golf dad and take his children around the course at dusk to chip and putt. He admitted, “I might owe the club a cart fee or two.”Major golf championships have long gone to storied, private clubs — think Baltusrol, Oakmont, Oak Hill and Winged Foot. More recently, they have ended up at challenging public or resort courses like TPC Harding Park, Bethpage Black and Kiawah Island.But it’s rare that these events go to a top-notch private club that also has members living around its perimeter, let alone touring pros who can walk out their doors and tee up.Yet this is the third time that the club has hosted a major international competition: It put on its first P.G.A. Championship in 2017 (won by Justin Thomas) and a Presidents Cup in 2022.Simpson — whose best professional finish at his home club was a tie for second in 2015 at the Wells Fargo Championship, seven shots behind the winner and this week’s favorite, Rory McIlroy — appreciates what he has.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More