Chip truck driver headed to RBC Canadian Open
After not playing a round of golf in 2018 and only a few in 2017, Michael Blair now finds himself preparing to play in the 2019 RBC Canadian Open.
What makes this mind-boggling turn of events even more unimaginable is that the 27-year-old lives in Ancaster, just a few minutes from Hamilton Golf & Country Club, so he’ll essentially tee it up in his first-ever PGA Tour event right in his own backyard.
“I graduated from Eastern Michigan University in the spring of 2015 and I have spent the better part of the last four years being injured with a sore shoulder and rotator cuff injuries,” says Blair, who has worked part-time in Ancaster as a Hostess Frito-Lay chip truck delivery driver for the past 18 months.
Although he picked up a business degree at Eastern Michigan University, and had a job lined up with RBC, the title sponsor for the Open, Michael decided to gut it out, get healthy again and give golf another shot this season. After rehabbing for all of 2018, Michael picked up his clubs in January and started working with his coach Nick Starchuk throughout February using an indoor simulator. Then he headed to Fort Myers, Florida in March and April to work on his game and prepare for PGA Tour Canada Q-School. He missed earning a card by sevral shots, so it was back to Ontario and the drawing board.
“I used the money that I saved up working at Frito-Lay to pay for my expenses in Florida, so it’s looking like a good investment at this time,” Michael says. “I probably played five or six rounds in May in Ontario and hit balls a few times leading up to the RBC Canadian Open Regional Qualifier at TPC Toronto on May 16.”
The Nelson High School graduate, who worked at Hidden Lake Golf Club for about 15 years, then went out and shot an 8-under-par 64 at the qualifier, earning a spot in the 2019 RBC Canadian Open – a dream come true.
Blair put together a spectacular round, sinking eagles on two par-fives on the back nine. Coupled with five front-nine birdies, Blair found himself two strokes ahead of the competition at the conclusion of play.
Twenty-one other players advanced to the final Monday, June 3 qualifying round at Heron Point Golf Links including local favourites and long-time HGCC members Chris Ross, who finished T6 at 6-under, and Nicholas Ross, who finished T9 at 3-under. HGCC member, J.J. Reagan missed the cut, finishing T30 at even par.
“I haven’t played in a tournament in two years, so it was nice to put it all together for one round. It should be an incredible week at HGCC. I was there to walk around for a round when the Open was at Hamilton in 2012. I got in for free because I looked so young and they thought I was a junior. This time I’ll be able to drive right into the main parking lot with all the other players – that’s pretty cool,” says Michael, who has been receiving lots of calls from friends looking for tickets. And he hasn’t chosen a caddie yet!
Local golfer Hughes expects Hamilton course to challenge at RBC Canadian Open
Mackenzie Hughes grew up about 15 minutes from Hamilton Golf and Country Club and says he has played the course around 50 times.
While the native of Dundas, Ont., will have the most experience playing the private course of any PGA Tour golfer who tees it up next week at the RBC Canadian Open, he hasn’t teed off there since more than 1,000 trees were removed a few years ago as part of an environmental restoration.
Still, Hughes says for the last two months almost everyone he’s been paired with on the PGA Tour has asked him about Hamilton. They mostly ask him to compare it to Glen Abbey and try to get a feel for its classic look.
“It’s pretty cool to be asked, and I do have great things to say about it,” Hughes said. “I like both courses but I have to give the edge to Hamilton because it’s more classic. Guys are excited about it.”
The RBC Canadian Open returns to the course in the Hamilton suburb of Ancaster for the sixth time, and on the 100th anniversary of when it first hosted the tournament – won by England’s James Douglas Edgar in 1919. Americans Tommy Armour (1930), Bob Tway (2003), Jim Furyk (2006), and Scott Piercy (2012) are the other winners at Hamilton, long considered one of the top courses in the country.
The club will also host the RBC Canadian Open in 2023.
FORT WORTH, TEXAS – MAY 26: Mackenzie Hughes of Canada plays his shot from the sixth tee during the final round of the Charles Schwab Challenge at Colonial Country Club on May 26, 2019 in Fort Worth, Texas. (Photo by Tom Pennington/Getty Images)
Scott Shannon, a member of the club and the 2019 Tournament Chair, says the 27-hole facility designed in 1914 recently went through a particularly rough winter. With ice and snow covering the ground, a chemical reaction caused damage to its greens.
The shade patterns of the all the trees were going to cause even further damage, so the club decided to remove more trees than what their normal turf maintenance program called for – between 250-300 per year.
Shannon said the course now has the kind of sightlines and “visual beauty” Harry Colt, the original architect, had in mind. He says the membership at the club hasn’t been this excited for the Canadian Open since 2003, when it came back for the first time since 1930.
The course will play as a par 70 for the RBC Canadian Open, and will measure between 6,850 and 6,950 yards – making it one of the shortest on the PGA Tour in 2019.
Bill Paul, the Chief Championship Officer for Golf Canada, says the golfers are going to enjoy playing a classic layout. He was the tournament director of the Canadian Open for more than two decades.
“I had this conversation with a lot of players in 2003. They said, ‘If they could ever get rid of a lot of trees, you’d be able to see the golf course a whole lot better.’ Fast-forward to 2019 and it’s there,” says Paul. “I just think it takes the golf course and makes it, from an aesthetic standpoint, more iconic.”
The layout is a stark contrast to Glen Abbey Golf Club in Oakville, Ont.
Glen Abbey is a modern layout that has hosted the RBC Canadian Open the last four years in a row, and the most of any course in the tournament’s history.
There are only two par fives at Hamilton, for example, and double that at Glen Abbey.
“Hamilton only gives you two chances (to score) and they’re no pieces of cake,” says Hughes, who likes how Hamilton makes a golfer think, compared to Glen Abbey.
“They’re very different. Hamilton’s greens to me will be a bit more of a challenge, but I’m not sure they’ll be able to get them that fast. The biggest difference for me is that Hamilton will provide different shots into greens and off the tee there’s a bit more variety.”
Shannon believes if the golf course dries out over the next few days and the rough stays at a reasonable length, the score won’t be too low. But if it’s waterlogged, it could be a different story.
“If the best players in the world can play target golf at a relatively short golf course and they don’t have to worry about it rolling into deep rough,” says Shannon, “then the number could get pretty low.”
The Canadian Open will be contested June 6-9. World No. 1 Brooks Koepka, No. 2 and defending champion Dustin Johnson, and multi-major winner Rory McIlroy, who is making his Canadian Open debut, headline the field.
Catching up with Corey Conners
PGA TOUR champion and Team RBC member Corey Conners previews Hamilton Golf & Country Club, site of the 2019 RBC Canadian Open.
Young Canadian golfers Dao and Osland looking to learn at U.S. Women’s Open
Watching the Henderson sisters – world No. 6 golfer Brooke and her caddy Brittany – was one of the best experiences of Celeste Dao’s young career. She’s hoping to put those lessons in to practice at this year’s U.S. Women’s Open.
Dao got to observe the Hendersons at last year’s event and is back in the field this week with Henderson. They’ll be joined by fellow Canadians Megan Osland and Naomi Ko at the Country Club of Charleston in South Carolina.
“Watching them around the greens, how they identify the chips or the second shots and where they could be,” said Dao of the Hendersons. “Then they work on that, finding different shots and different options. They are really focused around the greens, taking notes and finding all the angles.”
Dao, from Notre-Dame-de-l’Ile-Perrot, Que., is still an amateur and earned her way in to the second major of the LPGA Tour season in a qualifying event at TPC Boston on May 6. Osland, from Kelowna, B.C., qualified on the same day at an event at Bradenton Country Club in Florida. Ko, from Victoria, made it in at a qualifier at OGA Golf Course in Woodburn, Ore., on April 26.
Henderson, the 21-year-old phenom from Smiths Falls, Ont., will compete as the winner of the 2016 Women’s PGA Championship, but could have qualified a number of different ways.
“Growing up, (Brooke) was always my idol and a great model to follow,” said the 18-year-old Dao. “I played a practice round with her last year. I learned a lot from her and her sister.”
Osland has been playing on the Symetra Tour since 2016 and the 26-year-old is targetting an LPGA card within the year. This will be her first appearance at the U.S. Women’s Open and, like Dao, she hopes it will be a learning opportunity.
“Just being around the best players in the world, seeing how they prepare, how they play the course and stuff like that is something I can learn from,” Osland said. “I think overall it’s going to be a really cool experience playing alongside everyone and seeing how my game stacks up to everyone else.”
Osland played a full practice round on Tuesday and described the fairways as firm and the greens fast – perfect for her style of play. She appreciates that winning her qualifier and playing in a major is already a new high for her career.
“It’s definitely the biggest tournament that I’ve played in so far and I would say that it’s the biggest tournament in women’s golf,” she said. “Just to play, to get out there and play at that level I’m just really excited for it. I’m happy to be here.
“This week I’m just going to go out and play my best and see what happens.”
Rules of golf: Identifying your ball
After each stroke you make on a hole, you are supposed to find and play that same ball. Most of the time, it is possible to identify your ball without lifting it. But occasionally you need to lift it to do so.
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Rules of Golf: Substituting damaged ball
If you have reason to believe your ball has been damaged during play of a hole, you are allowed to mark the spot of the ball and then lift it without cleaning it, unless your ball is except on the putting green.
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Why it took 4 majors for Koepka to get his due
FARMINGDALE, N.Y. – Majors matter more than any other golf tournament.
They are not the sole measure of greatness.
And that might be one reason it took Brooks Koepka winning four majors – as many as Rory McIlroy, one more than Jordan Spieth among his contemporaries – for the 29-year-old Floridian to get the kind of attention his game deserves.
Never mind the No. 1 ranking that came with his victory Sunday in the PGA Championship. That could change in two weeks.
Koepka now is at that level – and it took back-to-back titles in the U.S. Open and PGA Championship to get there – that he makes people look when he walks onto the range, that he’s considered a top favourite wherever he goes without anyone having to look up the odds.
Why wasn’t it enough when he won last summer at Shinnecock Hills to become the first repeat winner of the U.S. Open in 29 years, and only the second player to successfully defend the U.S. Open since Ben Hogan in 1951? Same major, yes, but Erin Hills and Shinnecock were entirely different tests.
What kept him from megastar status when he added the PGA Championship last summer at Bellerive to join Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus, Hogan and Gene Sarazen as the only players to win the U.S. Open and the PGA in the same year? That kind of company is as elite as it gets.
What made Koepka different was that he seemed to show up only at the big events. That’s a nice problem to have.
Koepka now has won four of his last eight majors, a stretch not seen since Woods won seven of 11 in an amazing run through the 2002 U.S. Open at Bethpage Black. The only other tournaments Koepka won during his run of majors was the Dunlop Phoenix in Japan in 2017 (by nine shots) and the CJ Cup last fall in South Korea.
Woods won 19 other times during his stretch of majors, 15 of them on the PGA Tour.
Roger Maltbie’s description of Woods at Pebble Beach – “It’s not a fair fight” – goes well beyond that 2000 U.S. Open. It’s never fair to compare Woods with anyone. He won at a rate never before seen in golf, and it probably won’t happen again.
Koepka is aware that his trophy collection is weighted heavily toward the majors. Justin Ray of a golf analytics group called “15th Club” pointed out over the weekend that Woods and Koepka are the only active players who have more victories than missed cuts in the majors: 15-9 for Woods, 4-2 for Koepka.
Don’t get the idea that Koepka would trade any of his four majors for a few more Texas Opens or Phoenix Opens. It simply explains why it took longer for golf fans to embrace what he has done in the last two years.
Koepka touched on this Saturday night after he had a seven-shot lead – a PGA Championship record – and faced questions that were intended to find out what he was doing differently to win majors so regularly.
“I’m just that much more focused,” Koepka said. “I think I’m more focused than anybody out there. My focus probably goes up, I don’t know, tenfold of what it does in a tour event – which isn’t good. I mean, it’s good that I’m doing it in the majors, but I need to do that in regular weeks.”
Consider some other players from his generation.
McIlroy won 12 times starting with his first major in the 2011 U.S. Open through his fourth major in the 2014 PGA Championship. Spieth won the Masters and U.S. Open in 2015 when he chased the Grand Slam, but he also won the Valspar Championship, the John Deere Classic and the Tour Championship that year. Spieth was 23 when he won the third leg of the career Grand Slam at the 2017 British Open, and he already had 11 titles on the PGA Tour (14 worldwide).
They also had name recognition before they turned pro. McIlroy was the low amateur at Carnoustie in the 2007 British Open when he was 18. Spieth tied for 16th in the Byron Nelson Classic when he was 16.
FARMINGDALE, NEW YORK – MAY 19: Brooks Koepka of the United States poses with the Wanamaker Trophy during the Trophy Presentation Ceremony after winning the final round of the 2019 PGA Championship at the Bethpage Black course on May 19, 2019 in Farmingdale, New York. (Photo by Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images)
Koepka?
His last name was pronounced “Cupcake” on the first tee at the Phoenix Open in 2015, his first PGA Tour victory.
The game was always there.
His caddie, Ricky Elliott, recalls being asked to work for Koepka in the 2013 PGA Championship. He saw him for the first time on the range at Oak Hill. “I watched him striping it and thought to myself, ‘Happy day,”’ Elliott said.
In a 2015 interview with Golf Digest, Steve Williams, who was on the bag for 13 of Woods’ majors, was quoted as saying: “Once in a great while, a player comes along who hits a golf ball the way it was meant to be hit. Powerful, piercing, the perfect trajectory. Of the young players out there, one I’ve seen has that special ball flight: Brooks Koepka.”
Majors should never be dismissed for their value, for the legacy they create. At this point, Koepka really doesn’t need to win more PGA Tour titles to add to his reputation.
“Now he’s got it. And he got it in the right way,” Paul Azinger said Tuesday. “He has built his brand through self-belief and intestinal fortitude. By not getting attention, he has become a (tough guy) with a chip on his shoulder who says, ‘I can do anything you say I can’t.”’
That should do.
Rules of Golf: Replacing a ball
During a round, if your ball is moved or lifted by someone else, it must be replaced either by you or that person.
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Koepka handles the stress and reaps rewards of another major
FARMINGDALE, N.Y. – Brooks Koepka should know as well as anyone that nothing in golf comes easily.
His well-documented journey to the PGA Tour took him to remote outposts like Kenya and Kazakhstan. Even after Koepka won a second straight U.S. Open last summer, which no one had done in 29 years, it didn’t seem enough to be the first name mentioned among the next generation of stars.
So he spent three days setting records at Bethpage Black in the PGA Championship – the first player to shoot 63 in consecutive years in the majors, the lowest 36-hole score in major championship history and a seven-shot lead, the largest ever for 54 holes in the PGA Championship.
And then he endured the toughest day of his career Sunday, which turned into the most rewarding.
“I’m glad I’ve got this thing sitting next to me,” Koepka said as he looked at the shiny Wanamaker Trophy. “It’s very satisfying, this one. This is definitely the most satisfying of all the ones I’ve won.”
Moments earlier, after he turned a potential meltdown into the kind of clutch play that has defined his career, Koepka draped his muscular arms around the top of the trophy and let out a deep sigh from stress and satisfaction, and then he smiled.
Koepka said at the start of the week that majors are sometimes the easiest to win.
This one should have been.
It wasn’t.
His seven-shot lead was down to one with four holes to play and the No. 1 player in the world – Dustin Johnson, his best friend in golf – was piecing together the best round of a final day in 25 mph gusts that made Bethpage Black as fearsome as ever.
Koepka answered with all the right shots. Johnson faded with two bogeys. Koepka closed with a 4-over 74, the highest final round by a PGA champion in 15 years, and he didn’t care how it looked.
His place in history was secure. He joined Tiger Woods as the only players to win back-to-back in the PGA Championship since it switched to stroke play in 1958. He became the only player to hold back-to-back titles in two majors at the same time.
Four years ago, he had one PGA Tour title in his first full season as a full member. Now he has four majors out of the last eight he has played, a stretch not seen since Woods won seven out of 11 after capturing the 2002 U.S. Open at Bethpage Black.
“I just don’t understand why he doesn’t do it more often,” said Rory McIlroy, who won his four majors in a span of 15. “He obviously gets into these mindsets of the majors, and he really goes and gets into a different state. You’d obviously have to ask him. But it’s awesome. It’s great to watch.”
Woods twice won back to back in the PGA Championship, with tight battles in 1999 and 2000, comfortable wins in 2006 and 2007. Koepka was starting to draw comparisons with Woods for the way he obliterated the competition at Bethpage Black, much like Woods used to do.
In the end, there were no style points, only the trophy.
But that trophy spoke volumes.
Even louder was the gallery, and it wasn’t always pretty. Koepka had a six-shot lead when he walked off the 11th fairway. When he walked up to the green on the par-3 14th, with his ball over the green and Koepka headed for a fourth straight birdie, the chants jarred him.
They weren’t for him.
“DJ! DJ! DJ!” the cheers rained down for Johnson, who was on his way to another birdie up ahead on the 15th hole to pull within one shot. Koepka says he was more shocked than he was nervous, but he heard them.
“It’s New York. What do you expect when you’re half-choking it away,” he said. “I think I kind of deserved it. I’ve been to sporting events in New York. I know how it goes. I think it actually helped. It was at a perfect time because I was just thinking: ‘OK, I’ve got everybody against me. Let’s go.”’
And off he went – a powerful drive down the 15th fairway that set up a par he desperately need, an even better drive down the 16th hole, the hardest at Bethpage Black during the final round because the wind was whipping into his face.
That’s where Johnson lost all momentum, without doing much wrong. He hit a 5-iron from 194 into the fan – he though about 4-iron because he wasn’t sure 5-iron would get to the green – and was stunned when it one-hopped into the rough. He chipped to 7 feet and missed the par putt, and then went long on the par-3 17th, caught another nasty lie and made another bogey.
“I gave it a run,” Johnson said after his 69. “That’s all you can ask for.”
It’s more than Koepka would have wanted. But he has the trophy, the one that caused the most stress and brought the most satisfaction. No sooner was the PGA Championship over that Koepka was installed as a 5-1 favourite to win the U.S. Open.
No one has won three straight U.S. Open titles since Willie Anderson in 1905. That might be all the motivation Koepka needs.
Judith Kyrinis shares low amateur honours at U.S. Senior Women’s Open
SOUTHERN PINES, N.C. – Throughout her three-decade career, Helen Alfredsson has won wherever she’s played. Seven wins on the LPGA Tour. Eleven victories on the Ladies European Tour. A major champion. And now, she can finally add USGA champion to her list of accolades.
With a final-round 72, Alfredsson, 54, topped Trish Johnson and Juli Inkster by two strokes to capture the 2nd U.S. Senior Women’s Open Championship on Sunday at Pine Needles Lodge & Golf Club, with a 72-hole total of 1-over 285.
“Just to have something USGA, it feels very nice. Since one of my first years when I finished second, it was very special,” said Alfredsson, who is a two-time U.S. Women’s Open runner-up. “I know one of the toughest tests you ever will do in golf is play a U.S. Open. And I always like tough, I think. Maybe not at 54, but yeah, it’s nice to have that USGA [championship].
Alfredsson entered the final round tied at the top of the leader board with Johnson, who took full advantage of moving day with a third-round 66.
What started out as a roller-coaster round for the Swede turned into a steady stream of pars, many of them stress-free. After falling a stroke behind Johnson in the early going with a birdie and a bogey already on the scorecard, she hit her approach shot on the par-4 fourth hole to a foot to regain a tie for the lead.
Potential disaster struck on the very next hole, though, when her tee shot on the par-3 fifth missed short and right of the green. The ball paused for a moment but then rolled back all the way down to the bottom of a collection area, a familiar result with the Donald Ross green complexes at Pine Needles. It took Alfredsson three tries from there to find the putting surface, and she was fortunate to walk away with a double-bogey 5.
Hole No. 5 would be the last time she would put anything but pars on her scorecard, and as her fellow competitors tussled with the challenging layout on Sunday afternoon, her position on the leader board began to look better and better.
Alfredsson had her chances to separate herself from Johnson and Inkster, the latter shooting 2-under 33 on the front 9 to put herself squarely in the mix after starting the day four strokes back. A 12-foot birdie try on No. 11 went begging, and a sharp approach shot on No. 15 to 7 feet yielded just another par. But her round will be remembered for her bend-not-break resilience throughout the day, particularly down the stretch. She got up and down for par after missing the green with her approach shots on Nos. 12, 14 and 16, the last one coming when she curled in a slow-moving putt from about 5 feet.
2017 U.S. Senior Women’s Amateur champion Judith Kyrinis, of Canada, and Sally Krueger, of San Francisco, Calif., shared low-amateur honours with 72-hole totals of 23-over 307. Both earn exemptions into the 2020 U.S. Senior Women’s Open, which will be played July 9-12 at Brooklawn Country Club, in Fairfield, Conn.
Johnson, who finished third in the 2018 U.S. Senior Women’s Open at Chicago Golf Club, was tied with Alfredsson through 12 holes, but stumbled with back-to-back bogeys on Nos. 13 and 14. She hit her third shot on the par-5 15th hole to 2 feet to move within a stroke, but couldn’t convert birdie tries on the next two holes from 20 and 25 feet, respectively, all but ending her chances.
Inkster, who was the runner-up in 2018, also had opportunities to move ahead late in the afternoon, but couldn’t quite capitalize. She had makeable birdie tries on holes 12 through 15, the last one from 9 feet, but couldn’t find the bottom of the hole, ultimately settling for a second straight runner-up finish in the championship.
Michelle Redman had the low round of the day, shooting a 3-under 68 to tie for fourth at 5-over 289 with Jane Crafter.
Reigning champion Laura Davies, who started the day six strokes off the pace, shot a 2-over 73 to finish in a tie for ninth place.