FRIAR’S HEAD is a fine new golf course near the eastern end of Long Island, New York state. Designed by Ben Crenshaw and Bill Coore, it forms a trinity of courses with Shinnecock Hills and The National, and if you get a chance to play it, take it. It is full of understated holes unmarked by artificial water hazards and it is so British that it does not have tee markers or yardages on the holes. Golfers are expected to use their eyes to judge distances, as they used to have to do.
Yesterday, the Friar’s Head course became linked with Heather Bowie, who comes from Texas, and Royal Lytham & St Annes in Lancashire, where the Weetabix Women’s British Open, the last of the year’s women’s major championships, is being played. Bowie is eight under par and holds a two-stroke lead over Se Ri Pak, of South Korea, and Wendy Ward, Bowie’s fellow American.
Bowie’s 66 was one stroke more than the day’s best, 65s by Grace Park, the South Korean who went out in 29, and Lorena Ochoa, of Mexico, and Bowie attributed the way she played yesterday to long sessions with her coach on the practice ground at Friar’s Head the week before last.
“It was very windy there,” Bowie recalled. “It rained. It was definitely good preparation. I hit a lot of shots from 40 to 90 yards. I did not let myself use a sand wedge because that is what we do in America, where we hit a lot of sand wedges that we fly to the hole. You have to go out there and feel the shots you are required to play. That is what I did for three days prior to coming over here.”
All would be well with Bowie’s explanation for her good form except that there was no rain and little wind yesterday. After two inches of rain fell in one day a couple of weeks ago, as well as rain on Tuesday, what were then brown, fast-running fairways are now lush, green ribbons.
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Perhaps the answer is that she always plays well in the second round of this tournament — she went round in 65 on the Friday of last year’s competition.
This championship has clearly moved up a gear from last year’s at Turnberry. There were more than 16,000 spectators yesterday and when the sun shone, as it did for most of the day, it helped to create a festive atmosphere. People with sunburnt noses and legs wandered the course in shorts, licking ice-creams.
Once Bowie had taken the lead, the rest of the day was dominated by one of those macabre happenings that occur occasionally and cause every golfer who hears about them to recoil and whisper to themselves: “There but for the grace of God go I.”
The victim was Diana Luna, from Italy, who finished 43rd in the order of merit last year, her first as a touring professional.
Her scores for her last five holes would not have looked out of place in a monthly medal. Starting at the 14th, they read 12, 5, 5, 4, 10, a cumulative 15 over par. Her inward half was 55 and her finishing score of 95 was, by three strokes, the highest in this event in the past 17 years and nearly two strokes a hole more than the day’s best.
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Lytham’s finish is testing and its bunkers must be avoided at all costs. Luna’s scoring bore that out. From bunker shots at the 14th and 18th, her ball rebounded to hit her, which cost her two penalty strokes each time. It did not help that she took three putts at the 14th.
Normally Luna catches the eye for her model’s figure and looks and tumbling fair hair, but she was downcast after her round and someone who saw her in the locker-room described her as “looking as though she had been crying”.
Lytham’s famous bunkers had done for her good and proper. And to think, she is normally rather good at getting out of sand. She says so herself.
Leading two-round scores
136: H Bowie (US) 70, 66.
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138: Se Ri Pak (S Kor) 69, 69; W Ward (US) 67, 71.
139: A Fukushima (Japan) 72, 67; L Ochoa (Mex) 74, 65; P Meunier Lebouc (Fr) 70, 69; K Webb (Aus) 67, 72; Grace Park (S Kor) 74, 65.
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140: A Sorenstam (Swe) 68, 72; M Redman (US) 71, 69.
141: A Stanford (US) 72, 69.
142: B Morgan (Wales) 72, 70; S Gustafson (Swe) 73, 69; K Kuehne (US) 73, 69; G Simpson (Eng) 69, 73.
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143: C Kung (Taiwan) 73, 70; K Stupples (Eng) 69, 74; H Yamaguchi (Japan) 72 71; M Mallon (US) 71, 72; L Kane (Can) 69, 74.
144: L Brooky (NZ) 70, 74; M Ellis (Aus) 71, 73; V Goetze-Ackerman (US) 73, 71; S Sandolo (It) 73, 71; M Dunn (US) 70, 74; Woo-Soon Ko (S Kor) 72 72; C Koch (Swe) 70, 74; P Hurst (US) 73, 71; I Tinning (Den) 71, 73.
Other British: 145: L Davies (Eng) 75, 70. 147: J Head (Eng) 76, 71; S Strudwick (Eng) 75, 72; A Nicholas (Eng) 73, 74; K Taylor (Eng) 73, 74.
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