6-hour rounds?! 4 groups on a tee?! How Women’s Open turned into slog

ST. ANDREWS, Scotland — We’ve all seen slow play before but nothing quite like what the Old Course doled out during the first round of the AIG Women’s Open Thursday. 

Imagine you’re Leona Maguire, known for your ferocity and steely nature. You grew up in Ireland — the wind doesn’t bother you much. You’re grooving shots on the practice range into a 30- to 40-mph crosswind, prepping for a wicked round. You start on the 10th and make a frustrating bogey, but head to the 11th tee and find something much worse: not one, not two, not three but at least four groups are waiting to play the 148-yard par-3. 

Four groups on a tee?! (Maguire actually told reporters she thought there were six groups, though we were unable to confirm.) Pace of play became such a grind that players were instructed to wave up the group behind them to play into the green before putting out themselves. You sometimes see that on drivable par-4s but almost never on par-3s. But Thursday was an abnormal day.

Here’s why.

Holes 7 through 11 at the Old Course make up what is known as The Loop, where holes not only share greens but also fairways. The 7th and 11th actually intersect, which causes all sorts of issues for when amateurs are on the links. But it can force awkwardness for the pros, too, who want to play free of distraction, and are often waiting longer than normal for winds to calm before playing ahead. (Spectating can even prove difficult in this loop as fans can only move to the back nine once players pass the crosswalk on 12.)

Up ahead of Maguire on the 11th were Bailey Tardy, Wichanee Meechai and Nicole Broch Estrup. Broch Estrup had a downhill, 20-footer that she had marked on an exposed section of the 11th green. That part of the property is as far away as you can get from Auld Toon buildings or the hills of Fife that could serve as shields from the wind. What felt like 40-mph winds tore through the nearby Eden Estuary and through the 11th green. Broch Estrup simply could not get her ball to stay still. 

This situation on the 11th wasn’t unique. Players mentioned their balls falling off tees and oscillating in fairways. “It’s not only your ball-striking that you’re worried about but just even a three-, two-footer where you’re trying to hit the center of the clubface,” Lydia Ko said. “It sounds stupid because you’re like, how could you miss the center of the putter, but it’s so windy it’s blowing us over.”

All of this explains why an Open round that typically takes about five hours stretched toward six. And even beyond that mark. The wind wasn’t just harsh — it was also playing across the golf course. Pros can handle playing downwind or into the wind, but they hate a crosswind, aiming 30 or 40 yards away from their target. 

Back to the 11th: Broch Estrup placed her ball next to her mark at least four times and watched it trickle away from its place. More than one official came in to assess the situation, which lasted at least 20 minutes, and most likely a full half hour. That threesome was nearly two holes behind the group ahead of them and were trying to play forward, but Mother Nature was having none of it. 

News

Because the Women’s Open is taking place this week, at least three weeks later than usual, thanks to the Olympics, we have about an hour less daylight in St. Andrews. Tournament organizers decided the only way to get all 144 players around 18 holes each day is to use both the 1st and 10th tees at the same time, so having an unplanned delay on the 11th just as groups were beginning to tee off the 10th is how you get four (or maybe six) groups backed up on the same tee box. 

“We nearly waited an hour on the 11th tee,” Maguire said, later admitting she wished they were called up even earlier. But where would they go? The 12th tee sits right off the 11th green, and players crowding that tee box aren’t in any better position. For groups to play up to the 11th while others are on the green pushes them into the intersection with groups playing the 7th. 

All in all, it was just the kind of chaos that can take place at major championships where the stakes are immense, the setup is difficult and the conditions are brutal. Andrea Lee, pictured at the top of this article sitting on the 11th tee, had six hours and 15 minutes between her 1st tee shot and meeting with the media to talk about it. The marquee grouping of Nelly Korda, Lilia Vu and Charley Hull was on the opposite side of the property, and even they ran into a log-jam, resulting in a 6-hour, 8-minute round. And all three shot in the 60s. 

The crawling pace was abnormal but not shocking, especially given the gale-force winds. Tiger Woods’ afternoon round on Thursday of the 2022 Open Championship at the Old Course was just as slow — and it was played in much easier conditions. Woods, Max Homa and Matt Fitzpatrick looped around the Old in 6 hours and 10 minutes that day. As we wrote at the time, anytime the pace stretches that long, it’s a combination of about seven factors, and solving one of them won’t necessarily solve the others. 

As for Maguire, she labored on from that brutal wait on 11, sniping the green in the wind, making a par and shooting one-over 73. A fine score. The weekend forecast calls for slightly better conditions. Better scoring, too.