Cameron Smith has been licking his wounds after one of the most brutal days of his major-winning career at the British Open, shooting his first 80 in one of golf’s four major tournaments.
In 33 majors nine years ago, the 30-year-old Queenslander has never before suffered the indignity he experienced in Thursday’s opening round at Royal Troon, when he shot 9-over. Rod scores.
A bogey on the first hole and a triple bogey on the second allowed Smith to surpass his previous worst round in a major, the 2018 U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills. During the tournament, another round of 79 was nine over par.
The player may have felt worse, however, as his nine bogeys and one triple bogey tied him with inspired 2019 champion Shane Lowry and he shot a perfect 66, better than the Australian The man’s disastrous score was at least 14 strokes higher and he ended up sweeping second place.
His round ruled out any realistic chance for Smith, who has performed well on the LIV Tour and now regains the Claret Jug he won at St. Andrews two years ago.
“It was a bad day, really. If you had told me yesterday that I was going to shoot that, I wouldn’t have said it was possible,” Smith said. “But yeah, just a bad start and not really making any putts when I needed to get back in. Had some bad breaks as well.
In fact, it could have been worse, as Smith birdied two of his final three holes to provide himself with minimal consolation. Playing alongside two major champions in Lowry and Matt Fitzpatrick at least fueled his championship spirit.
“If you ask me, it’s really hard. If you ask Sean, it’s probably a different story,” Smith said of their respective bouts. “No, it’s hard, man. There’s a lot of crosswinds. It’s hard to keep your ball in the fairway and when you’re in the rough you’re guessing based on the bounce you’re getting whether it’s going to go short or not.
“It’s brutal, it’s a really good test of golf, you need to shoot under par in an A+ game and I saw that firsthand. Great game Shane.
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After the second ball went out of bounds, Smith shrugged: “There’s a lot of golf after that. Anything can happen. I’ve done it before. I think it was actually on the second hole as well that I tripled my score, and won a golf tournament.
“There are a few things that roll over in your head just to stimulate you and make you think. But yeah, it was a brutal day.
Doubly frustrating, he feels he has been “very confident” after finishing sixth at Valderrama in Spain last week, one of a string of top-10 LIV results he has enjoyed recently.
“I’ll go out and try to hit the ball really low until the weekend. It’s a tough task because the golf course doesn’t really give you a lot of easy shots,” Smith shrugged. There is no other way I can change it. It’s just a bad day.
