Pádraig Harrington is at Newport Country Club where he is set to contest the U.S. Senior Open alongside 1995 Walker Cup teammate Jody Fanagan among others, and coming off the back of his third successive victory at the Dick’s Sporting Goods Open, and hopes the omens are good as he goes in search of a second U.S. Seniors victory in three attempts.
But the challenge that Newport Country Club is going to present is vastly different from that at En-Joie Golf Club last week, so whether his good form translates is hard to call.
“I don’t know,” he admitted. “It’s a different style of golf course for sure this week. I think you’re going to have a certain amount of wind this week. You’ve got to try to keep the ball as low as you can most of the week.
“Yeah, you really couldn’t compare the two golf courses at all. Different style. This week is, like every tournament, you’re trying to get your routines and your mental game right, get it going into the event, so that you’re sharp from Thursday morning.
“Hopefully during the tournament everything builds and gets better all the way to Sunday afternoon. You just want to give yourself a chance with nine holes to go.”
He’s getting his first look at the Rhode Island course and likes what he sees with the linksy feel, but he says that the mindset is that you’re playing the golf course, not playing the U.S. Senior Open.
“There’s not many with the clubhouse,” he replied when asked what other courses it reminded him of. “I think that’s unique. I think I’d like to come here with nothing here and just go up and sit outside on the balcony, the clubhouse, and go out and look at the golf course. I think that would be a very nice, enjoyable afternoon.
“As regard to the golf course, I think we said Muirfield a little bit, when you’re out on the golf course. That would be the one that comes to mind. Pretty decent wide spaces, but with the fairways and bunkers inside it.
“Yeah, something like that, a few hedge rows out there. Maybe that would be the one.
“Outside of that, as I said, the thing that struck me is really the stature of the clubhouse and how it looks out over the course. My playing partner yesterday, Todd [White], he won the U.S. Senior Amateur. He put it right. Like I said, just like everything with Paddy’s Golf Tips, I plagiarize it. He’s come here to play at the Newport Country Club, not the U.S. Open, which is a great way of looking at it because who wouldn’t want to come here and play Newport Country Club? It’s just a beautiful spot.”
There is an idea that U.S. Open and all variations of it require a degree of luck to come out on top, but while some others shy away from the fact, Harrington embraces it and believes that a certain element of luck is an integral part in any tournament win.
“It’s never a burden to carry an amount of luck,” he said. “Every tournament I’ve ever won, every tournament anyone has ever won, luck has been on their side. In many ways. It’s not just you getting a good break, it could be you not getting a bad break, and you don’t even notice it.
“We’ve seen it over the years. You could have a terribly difficult pin, say a crazy pin setup — it doesn’t happen often, but crazy pin. Guys are coming in afterwards and complaining. You just happened to hit it underneath the hole and didn’t even notice it was a crazy pin and walked off, and that’s luck.”
The PGA Tour announced last week a new Signature Event exemption category, dubbed the ‘Tiger Woods exemption’, that extends tournament invitations to anybody with over 80 PGA Tour wins. Since Woods’s reduced playing schedule makes it unlikely that he’d qualify outright for the relatively new elevated events, this would guarantee him access for any and all he wishes to tee it up in.
While criticism has come from some corners, Harrington dismisses them and feels that Woods has more than justified his right to play wherever, whenever.
“He’s earned it,” Harrington said. “He’s earned it ten times over. He’s earned it with every part — yeah, his play, even his current standing, everything. He’s well good enough. Yeah, 100 percent behind that. The TOUR has to operate and have enough leeway to make sure that they could make decisions like that, and it was definitely the correct decision.
“There’s plenty of other people at other times, I’m sure, but he has definitely earned it at this particular time, no doubt about it. Delighted to see that.”