Rory McIlroy has described Shinnecock Hills as potentially the best championship test in the United States, praising its demands on every facet of the game as he prepares for this week’s U.S. Open.
The 2011 champion, who has made several reconnaissance visits to the course, highlighted its strategic depth and the need for patience amid variable conditions.
“It’s a great golf course,” McIlroy said. “I think if everything is going the way everyone wants it in terms of weather, setup, I think it’s the best championship test in the country. It tests all aspects of the game: driving, iron play, you need to have your wits about you on the greens. It’s a lot of strategy, thoughtfulness.”
Shinnecock Hills’s location on Long Island which juts out into the Atlantic Ocean and has little protection from the elements, means that the conditions that the course experiences can change fast and dramatically, which is something that McIlroy is well aware of.
“Look, it’s a golf course where it can turn very quickly,” he said. “You get a day like yesterday with a lot of wind and dry, clear conditions like this, and I think we’re just going to have to be mindful of that as the week goes on. But it’s a wonderful golf course, and looking forward to the test that it’s going to provide this week.”
McIlroy acknowledged differences from the 2018 U.S. Open at the same venue, particularly regarding fairway width. “The width of the fairways is a little bit different, but again, looking at the forecast, and there’s going to be a lot of crosswinds, those fairways are going to play a lot — especially if it gets a little firmer, they’re going to play a lot narrower than the 45 yards wide that they average,” he explained. He pointed to several holes with challenging angles, including the third, sixth, ninth, and 18th.
McIlroy’s intended strategy is going to require a mixture of imagination and restraint. He cited holes such as the first and 13th, where tempting opportunities can arise depending on the wind, but risk luring players into mistakes.
“This course, it demands so much patience, and it can really lure you into taking on things that you probably shouldn’t,” he said. “If you can get your ball to the middle of the greens here and just putt to the corners wherever the flags are going to be, that’s never going to be a bad strategy.”
This patient style has served him well in recent U.S. Opens, even if it has not yet delivered a title to accompany the one he earned at a soft and extremely playable Congressional Country Club 15 years ago. “I definitely feel like I’ve become a lot better of a U.S. Open player by trying to really stay patient throughout the week and not taking on too much,” McIlroy added.
The USGA has said that it intends to gradually increase the firmness and speed of the greens, without running into the same sort of problems that were experienced in either 2004 or 2018 at this venue, but McIlroy cautioned against ramping up the speed of the greens too much.
“We’ve seen what’s happened here the last two U.S. Opens. It doesn’t need to get that fast to play incredibly difficult and challenging,” he said, noting that yesterday’s greens averaged about 11½ on the Stimpmeter. With gusts expected up to 35-40 mph on Thursday, he suggested they may ease back to around 10-10.5.
McIlroy drew a careful distinction between a difficult setup and an unfair one.
“It’s a very, very fine line. I think good shots getting rewarded and bad shots getting punished,” he said.
“It’s a very challenging golf course to begin with. I actually made this point yesterday, as well. The greens are pretty soft already, or they were yesterday, which actually makes some of the shots around the greens more difficult because the ball runs away from the greens, and then you’re chipping up into the slopes, and the softer the green is, the harder it is to get the ball back up the slope and, like, bump it into the hills.
“The firmer the green is, it almost makes the bump and runs a little easier. Sometimes the softness of the green actually makes the short game a little trickier and tougher. So firm and fast doesn’t always mean more difficult, just depending on the shots that you have.”
Graeme McDowell became the first European to win a U.S. Open in 40 years when he won at Pebble Beach in 2010, and McIlroy, Justin Rose, Martin Kaymer, Jon Rahm and Matt Fitzpatrick have all followed suit in the 15 editions that followed. And McIlroy believes that European and UK players could feature prominently once again given the suitability of Shinnecock’s test.
“This is more a UK/European style of test than certainly the first two majors at Augusta and Aronimink,” McIlroy noted. “So it certainly wouldn’t surprise me to see a few players from Europe and the UK in contention on Sunday.”
Overall, the six-time major champion is relishing the challenge and is eager to get underway when he joins fellow Europeans and Ryder Cup stars Tommy Fleetwood and Ludvig Åberg on the tee on Thursday morning.
“It’s a wonderful golf course, and looking forward to the test that it’s going to provide this week,” he reiterated.
Leave a comment