To win any major championship, you need a little bit of luck — or maybe a lot of bit of luck — perhaps especially so at the linksy Open Championship. Shane Lowry knows that all too well, and he got another lesson on Saturday when a marshal’s leg came between him and disaster.
Lowry, the 2019 Open champion, began Saturday’s third round with a two-shot lead. But when he made it to the par-4 11th, the ‘Railway’ hole, his lead had narrowed to one on a rainy, windy day at Royal Troon. The 11th gets its name from the train that runs along the right side, and with deep gorse running up the left, it’s one of the hardest tests on the course.
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So hard that Lowry made double bogey there in his second round on Friday, one of the few blemishes in a round of 69 that earned him the 36-hole lead.
He ended up needing a big break to avoid a crooked number for the second-straight day.
On Saturday, Lowry’s tee shot found the fairway, leaving him with 233 yards to the green. But his lengthy approach shot went wayward quickly, ducking low and to the left. The NBC broadcast showed Lowry’s ball racing toward the gorse off the left side of the fairway, and it looked like nothing could keep it from burying in the bushes, and burying Lowry’s Open hopes along with it.
But then fortune struck. As Lowry’s ball made its way toward the gorse, an Open Championship marshall was walking on a path that looked like it would intersect with the ball. Crucially, the marshal wasn’t looking at the ball.
So as cameras rolled, Lowry’s ball struck the leg of the marshal, and remained in the rough, avoiding a disastrous fate. NBC’s Mike Tirico immediately called it a “massive, massive break” on the TV broadcast.
Check it out below.
Unfortunately, Lowry was unable to save par, dropping into a tie for the lead at five under at that point, and setting up a crowded leaderboard and a tense back nine.
But if not for a little unintentional help from the marshal, it could have been a whole lot worse.
