Cut or not, Martin calls playing at St. Andrews a ‘bucket list’ experience
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland
BEN MARTIN PLANNED on a restful sleep Friday night at his accommodations, a 10-minute walk from The Old Course and the 144th British Open Championship. No stressing out or sweating over whether he would make the 36-hole cut in his first visit here.
Of course, the Greenwood native added, he planned to keep his cell phone – and its Open Championship app – handy during the night.
With two holes left in his second round, the third-year PGA Tour player looked to be safely among the top 70 and ties advancing to weekend play. But then the 17th hole – the toughest at the Old Course by far, playing more like a par-5 scoring-wise Friday – bit Martin for the second straight round. This time it was a double-bogey 6, which dropped him to 1-over par.
He rallied with a five-foot birdie at the 18th and sat at even-par, squarely on the bubble. Told he was, at that moment, outside the cut line, he grinned.
“If the wind picks up again, 1- or 2-over could make the cut,” he said. “The weather over here is so crazy (that) you can never tell what will happen.”
Welcome to the Open Championship education of Ben Martin, playing links golf for the second year, including last year’s trip to Royal Liverpool, which as he said is NOT St. Andrews.
“This course is a lot different,” Martin said. “Similar blind shots, hidden bunkers, but ...”
But this is the Home of Golf, the alpha and omega for players worldwide. This is where history and reputations are made more often than at any other Open venue. Martin at 27 is a relative babe in the golf ranks. But he’s learning, true to his nature, steadily.
On Thursday, he managed one birdie, shooting 2-over 74 to fall into a tie for 109th. Friday, Martin bogeyed the first hole, putting him further in jeopardy. But with a birdie at the fifth hole, he kicked his game into high gear, with two more birdies in a row and five over the next seven holes, getting to 2-under.
“He started making putts, getting the ball in hole, and you saw how that changed his confidence, his whole attitude,” Martin’s caddie and former Clemson golf teammate Alex Boyd said. “He started playing well the way Ben’s been playing the past couple of months.”
No matter how the cut turns out – because of a nearly six-hour rain delay Friday morning, there was no chance the entire field would finish before dark – Martin’s trip is turning out pretty much as he hoped. St. Andrews is “kind of a bucket list thing,” he said. “I feel I’ve been playing kind of average, so if I sneak in and play the weekend, that’s kind of a bonus.”
Either way, he’ll leave after his Scottish fortnight – he finished a solid 17th at last week’s Scottish Open – with a better understanding of what it takes. Martin felt it was a style that would suit him.
This week has been enlightening for Martin in other ways.
First things first: he has not tried haggis, Scotland’s national dish. Nor does he intend to do so.
“I looked up what it is,” he laughed, “and I’m not going to try any of it.”
Google it and you’ll understand.
Then there is the strange story behind why he’s in St. Andrews accompanied by his mother, Suzie, instead of his wife, Kelly. Kelly’s sister, who is getting married this weekend, had asked Kelly for a list of suitable July dates (per Ben’s schedule) for the wedding. Kelly looked at July 18 and saw the word “Open,” and thought, “Perfect.”
When Ben arrived home, he informed her that wasn’t “open” as in idle, but “Open” as in here.
“I hate to miss the wedding,” he said, “but I knew if I qualified, no way I could miss this.”
On the other hand, Kelly “hates not being here, too.”
Meanwhile, Boyd spent Monday, a day of rest for his player, walking the Old Course to learn its quirks and bounces and blind tee shots.
“It helps that the (course guide) book we have has pictures,” he said, grinning.
Martin admits he didn’t exactly know what to expect ... and in ways, still doesn’t.
“Even watching on TV all those years, I think it’s tough to get feel for this course,” he said. “It’s not what I expected, but I’d only played two links courses before ... it was a little different than what ... I don’t know what I thought, but it’s different.”
Spoken like a true Open/links rookie. He’s glad he has years ahead to try and figure it out.
Now, if the winds and bunkers and blind shots late Friday and Saturday will take their toll on the rest of the field, maybe he’ll get two more days this week to do that.
This story was originally published July 17, 2015 at 10:56 PM with the headline "Cut or not, Martin calls playing at St. Andrews a ‘bucket list’ experience."