HOYLAKE, England — Players voiced their displeasure with the Royal Liverpool bunkers at the 151st British Open on Thursday and the R&A has responded by making an adjustment for Friday’s second round.
Championship organizers changed the way the bunkers were raked overnight.
“Yesterday afternoon the bunkers dried out more than we have seen in recent weeks and that led to more balls running straight up against the face than we would normally expect,” the R&A said in a statement released on Friday morning. “We have therefore raked all of the bunkers differently to take the sand up one revet on the face of the bunkers. We routinely rake bunkers flat at most Open venues but decided this adjustment was appropriate in light of the drier conditions which arose yesterday. We will continue to monitor this closely for the remained of the Championship.”
Much had been made about how grounds crews had flattened the bunkers in advance of the tournament, a move that didn’t allow wayward shots to settle comfortably in the middle. The result had been an array of difficult lies for players, some in fairway bunkers and others while cozying up to the greens.
World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler discussed on Wednesday how penal the bunkers can be, how they made him nervous and how unusual he found them to be in comparison to what he experienced in 2021 at Royal St. George’s in England.
“I feel like at St. George’s a lot of the bunkers had a tiny bit of an upslope before you got to the wall face, and here it seems like the faces of every bunker is almost a downslope going towards it,” he said. “I don’t think that’s something I particularly like in a golf course. I think it doesn’t reward the good shots as much. If you’re closer to the green you end up closer to the lip, and if you get a worse shot and barely get into the bunker you actually have a play.
“So I would prefer if there was a little bit of slope there, but that’s what’s so special about the majors. Every golf course is different and it’s a challenge, and I’m just going to do my best to stay out of them this week.”
Added Rory McIlroy after the first round: “When you hit it into these bunkers you’re sort of riding your luck at that point and hoping it’s not up against one of those revetted faces.”
But thanks to the adjustment made by the R&A, McIlroy said he had a better chance to make
“I hit a 4-iron into the 5th hole today, and it pitched on top of the bunker and came back in, and I thought it was going to be — like I didn’t know at this point (about the change) that they’d made that little gradual rise up into the face, and when I got up there, I was pleasantly surprised that I had a shot,” McIlroy said. “Yeah, I wouldn’t say there’s one person in the field that wouldn’t welcome that change.”
