After the drama of The Open Championship at St Andrews last week, the golfing world’s attention moves up the Scottish coastline to Carnoustie as some of the game’s all time greats compete in The 24th Senior Open Championship presented by MasterCard.
For American Tom Watson, the record equalling three-time Senior Open Champion, it will be a sentimental return to Carnoustie’s Championship Course where he won the first of his five Open Championships in 1975.
The 60 year old is trying to win a third Senior Open Championship on a links course where he previously lifted the Claret Jug, having already completed the ‘double’ at Turnberry and Muirfield.
“I love playing links golf and I love Scotland and the golf fans here,” he said. “The Senior Open Championship is a truly great event. It attracts the best players in the world and the atmosphere is so friendly it makes you want to play here.”
Watson will face some stern competition from the European Senior Tour’s finest, led by four of Europe’s last five Ryder Cup Captains in Mark James, Bernhard Langer, Sam Torrance and Ian Woosnam. Sadly, the most recent past Captain, Sir Nick Faldo, was forced to withdraw due to tendonitis.
Woosnam, the 2008 Senior Tour Order of Merit winner, won the 1996 Scottish Open at Carnoustie and is fully aware of the challenge the notoriously difficult Championship Course will pose to the field.
“I feel like I’m playing a lot better at the moment,” said the former World Number One. “I’ve changed my grip and it feels a lot better and I’ll see if I can get it together. I feel like I’m getting my confidence back and I’ve won at Carnoustie before so I feel like I have a chance.
“Carnoustie is tough though. If you aren’t playing well you could shoot millions. You have to be patient. You are going to make some bogeys out there but you have to accept that and make birdies on the holes you can. When I won in 1996 it was just sheer hard work."
Also in the field will be Corey Pavin, who will become the first presiding Ryder Cup Captain to play in The Senior Open Championship, and former US Ryder Cup Captain Tom Lehman, who tees it up having already captured the season’s first Senior Major Championship – the US Senior PGA Championship – and who boasts an impressive tied 14th finish in The Open at St Andrews last week.
Lehman, who captured the Claret Jug in 1996, is one of six former Open Champions playing at Carnoustie, along with Watson, Sandy Lyle, Faldo, Mark O’Meara and American Mark Calcavecchia, who makes his debut in a Senior Major Championship.
Calcavecchia, the 1989 winner, who played in the final pairing of the third round at St Andrews, said: “I think my game suits Carnoustie and it is a course I like a lot. I had a decent Open there a few years back. We'll see. You never know. It depends on what kind of weather you get stuck in, if you get the good draw or the bad draw. A lot depends on that over here.
“Carnoustie is one of my favourite courses and I’m immensely looking forward to it. I think it’s going to be right up my alley.”
Defending the title this week will be American Loren Roberts who captured his second Senior Open crown 12 months ago when he defeated Mark McNulty and Fred Funk in a play-off at Sunningdale.
Roberts is relishing the chance to write himself into the record books as he attempts to equal Watson and Gary Player’s tally of three Senior Open Championships.
“Carnoustie is a hard golf course – I know that from The Open in 2007. The last four holes are unbelievable but I just love links golf - it fits my game - and hopefully I can defend my title.”
It is the first time the Senior Open Championship has visited Carnoustie, which has hosted The Open Championship on seven occasions. After last year’s Championship at Sunningdale, the Senior Open also returns to Scotland for the first time since Royal Troon in 2008.
Among the home challengers will be Scotsman Andrew Oldcorn who, along with Barry Lane, makes his Senior Open debut.
Oldcorn finished as the leading European in May’s US Senior PGA Championship in a share of eighth place and the Edinburgh resident heads to Carnoustie buoyed by his runner up finish in the last Senior Tour event, the Van Lanschot Senior Open.
