Yeah, it was disappointing at Hoylake, being a past champion, and being where I’m from, people always expect you to perform well on these types of courses. Living over in the States now, and the courses I play in week in week out, it even takes like me a while to get back to feeling comfortable playing on links golf.
I felt a bit rusty with it all on at the Scottish Open, but I got back into it and shot a couple of low rounds, but I also hit some really weird shots that I would never normally hit on a links.
I felt like there was decent stuff in there at Hoylake but I also made a few silly mistakes and they cost you round a course like that. It wasn’t easy, as some of the scores showed.
It was hard to settle – you stand on every tee and almost every bunker is in play, and you’re kind of trying to figure out what to do because if you lay back, long way in, it’s quite tricky, and you’re just playing for pars.
If take it on and hit a bad shot and end up in a bunker, it’s a dropped shot at best. It asks a lot of questions, and it’s the most well-bunkered course that we play. They’re everywhere, and they’re very penal.
As for the other tournaments, yeah top-20 finishes make for ok reading, but I wasn’t really in
a position to win any of them going into the final round, and that’s what you want in a major, to go out on Sunday knowing you’re really in the mix, so while it looks ok on paper, I know that I need to put myself in a better position on Saturdays.
It is what it is. You can’t really look at the majors in their own right, yes, they are the big ones, but you also have to look at where you’re game is trending and hope that you can peak at the right time, while not being in a trough in between. I’ve been fairly consistent this year, but not nearly enough top 10s or top 5s.