The US Open is the major that made Pádraig Harrington realise he wasn’t good enough to win one of golf’s four flagship events. It’s also the major that made him believe he was capable of winning one and it remains the major he believes is best suited to his game as he looks to win a fourth major title.
The Open Championship has long been dubbed as Harrington’s best chance of adding one more major crown to his glittering CV and at 54, even that window looks to be closing. But the three-time major winner feels the mental challenge the US Open provides is tailor-made for him, with Shinnecock Hills providing a links feel with the usual dosage of brutality for golf’s hardest major.
“Bar the wins yes, the US Open is the one that suits me the most because it usually has a very strong element of mental fortitude and being able to deal with the good and the bad breaks,” Harrington said ahead of his first US Open appearance this week since 2023 where he finished T27.
“I like the style of US Open golf courses in general, the heavy rough doesn’t scare me whatsoever. They are the ones that I go into where I am quite comfortable with the test.”
Somewhat amazingly, the 5 inch rough which is expected this week, won’t intimidate the Dubliner as much as the water hazards of Augusta National or even the pot bunkers of Royal Birkdale next month will.
“Open Championship venues are good for me and I grew up on them and know what I’m doing but I think I am more intimidated by a golf course with water on it like Augusta and out of bounds. Pot bunkers intimidate me on a links course, tree lined courses are where I am most comfortable. Clearly Shinnecock is not that, we are going to a links style. Everybody going there has to be aware that they need their best mental game, there will be a lot of ups and downs.”
The statistics actually back up Harrington’s opinion that the US Open is the major that his best suited to his game. He has missed just four cuts, although he didn’t make an appearance from 2014 to 2023. But his record of five top-10 finishes including three top-5s makes it his most consistent major despite not winning.
After missing the cut on his debut in 1997, Harrington felt he played some of his best golf a year later at Olympic Club but could only muster a forgettable T32. That made him realise he needed to improve his ball striking to join golf’s elite. Last month at 54, he felt a T18 at the PGA was not his best performance.
Three top-10s in four years between 2000 and 2003 came but the US Open is the first major he should have won before breaking through with two Open Championships and a PGA.
2006, Winged Foot. Harrington needed three pars to claim the title and despite doing the hard work in finding all three fairways he walked away empty handed after three bogeys. But that was the week he knew he had the game to win a major.
2007 and 2008 saw him break through in golf’s big four and he almost came full circle in the US Open in 2012 at Olympic Club where he almost backdoored himself into a victory only to miss out on a potential playoff with Webb Simpson. Standing on the 18th fairway with 116 yards, the number one wedge player from 75-125 on the PGA Tour at that time plugged his approach in the green side bunker and there went another opportunity.
Perhaps it’s the fine margins, the odd good break here and there, that hasn’t gone his way in the US Open.
“After 1998 I changed coach and started working with Bob Torrance. I knew I needed to be a better ball striker and then in 2006 Winged Foot I needed three pars to win I hit three good tee shots which is usually the hard work. That was the first time I walked off any major tournament where I felt I could have won without being anything out of the ordinary. I felt like I didn’t need the breaks and I felt if I played my own game I could win. Up to that I was thinking maybe I could win if I got lucky.
“In Olympic Club (2012) I needed to get up and down from that bunker to get into the playoff. It would have been a hell of a break to get in there. Talking about breaks, I hit an iron off the tee on 18 my ball was a foot from going on to the up slope so I was still on the downslope which made all the difference I was trying to cut it up the hill and hit it dead straight off the lie whereas another foot forward I would have been on the upslope and not trying to get the ball up in the air to stop it.
“These are the subtle things that happens in tournaments when people win. It’s always the same, the guy winning, some bad things don’t happen and it can make all the difference. You do everything right as a pro for when you do get the breaks it’s a winning week.”
Course setup dominated the headlines of last month’s PGA Championship in Aronimink with some players blasting certain pin positions. Shinnecock Hills is the patron saint of tricked up golf course setups having been essentially burned out in 2004 when Retief Goosen won.
Greens were being watered between shots that year while a questionable pin position saw Phil Mickelson add to his gluttony of US Open mishaps in 2018 by purposefully hitting his golf ball while still in motion to stop it from rolling off the green.
2018 was a wake up call for the USGA and it is fair to say they have put on a spectacular product since. However, there will still be the mumbling few. Harrington had no time for those who grumbled and cursed their luck at the PGA Championship and he won’t be offering any sympathies this week either.
“Somebody will hit two shots on a par 4 to fifteen feet and knock it in or even two putt and walk on and they’ll get to the clubhouse and everyone will be like ‘did you see that pin position?'” he continued.
“If you hit it in the right place you won’t even realise that the hole is difficult, if you hit it in the wrong place it’s different. Shinnecock can be like that if you hit it in the wrong place it can be back and forth, if your group play the hole well it barely registers that it was so difficult. Everyone going there will be fully tuned in to having their best mental game ever.”
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