‘I didn’t expect that’: Padraig Harrington’s emotional Open 1st-tee moment

PORTRUSH, Northern Ireland — When Padraig Harrington came off the range early Thursday morning, some 20 minutes before his tee time, he saw something that dismayed him: a vacant set of 1st-tee bleachers.

“I could see the grandstand, and it was empty,” he said. “I was like, ‘I thought this was going to be full.'”

Harrington, beloved 53-year-old Irishman and two-time Open Champ, had been hand-picked by the R&A to hit the first tee shot of this year’s tournament — just the second held outside Great Britain in the last 70 years. Also in his group: 22-year-old Northern Irishman Tom McKibbin. The veteran and the youngster made a fitting pair to kick off the festivities. Surely there’d be a crowd there to see it?

But as Harrington climbed up and over a nearby walkway, he realized the explanation. A queue snaked out behind the grandstand; they just hadn’t let anybody in yet. Soon they did, waiting for the 6:35 a.m. tee time.

“By the time we got there, the grandstand was full, the 1st fairway was full, the 1st green was full,” he said.

And as he approached the tee, he felt a sudden wave of emotion, the type, he joked, that he’ll feel when he’s watching a movie on a plane. It’s not a feeling he’s familiar with on the golf course.

“Not like that, no,” he said. “It felt like they were there for me, giving me a clap, yeah. I expected the nerves; I didn’t expect that. So I did have to adjust myself for that.”

Harrington had prepped exhaustively for the shot itself, pumping 3-iron after 3-iron on the range beforehand.

“I probably hit 30 3-irons, 40 3-irons in my warmup,” he said.

The first tee shot at Portrush is famously uncomfortable. There’s O.B. left, O.B. right and two well-placed bunkers guarding the fairway. The tee shot buried Rory McIlroy at the 2019 Open, who arrived with the weight of the island on his shoulders and walked off with a quadruple-bogey 8. McKibbin admitted he arrived “a little bit scared” to the same shot.

“I think Rory’s made that tee shot a lot scarier. That’s all I could probably think about for the last three days,” he said.

Harrington found the fairway, though he was far enough back — 210 yards — that he had another 3-iron into the green. He flushed that, too, and it settled some 15 feet from the hole. He poured his putt in the middle, giving a giant grin as the early-morning crowd roared its approval.

“Holing the putt was a serious buzz. It was very exciting, and the crowds were spectacular at that hour of the morning,” he said.

Things only got tougher from there; Harrington three-putted several times, lost a tee shot and made one other birdie en route to four-over 75. But Harrington is an optimist and a golf romantic; he came off the course feeling grateful for the opportunity.

“It was very special, I’ve got to say,” he said. “It’s a great honor to do it, as I said. I really hate the idea of being ceremonial, but I was prepared to take that to do it.”

He felt grateful, too, for the crowds that followed him all the way around.

“There’s a great atmosphere out there. To be honest, lots of people I know. Any time you look up, you see a face — ‘oh, yeah.’ Most of the time [his caddie] Ronan says, ‘that’s so-and-so.’ So there’s a lot of people.”

And he was grateful to leave feeling like Friday could be another day.

“I don’t see why I can’t play great golf, and I enjoy doing it,” he said. “That’s the beauty of it — I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Harrington’s self-belief is based in good play; he won the U.S. Senior Open two weeks ago. But this week is another chance to test himself against the best — a chance he relishes. Post-round he was asked if he feels envious of younger players competing for more and more money; he didn’t bite.

“No, not a bit. No envy of any of the good players, the young guys, the way the game has gone, the money in the game, nothing like that,” he said. “I did exceptionally well, and the guys before me, I’ve done better than them. It’s just the natural way it goes.”

But that doesn’t mean he’s content with being ceremonial.

“I still try and fight it,” he added.

He’ll fight again tomorrow.