{"id":742716,"date":"2026-06-17T17:01:18","date_gmt":"2026-06-17T17:01:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/742716\/"},"modified":"2026-06-17T17:01:18","modified_gmt":"2026-06-17T17:01:18","slug":"u-s-open-2026-the-shinnecock-greens-are-so-tough-alex-fitzpatrick-is-practicing-with-a-vr-headset-australian-golf-digest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/742716\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Open 2026: The Shinnecock greens are so tough Alex Fitzpatrick is practicing with \u2026 a VR headset? \u2013 Australian Golf Digest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>How tough are the greens at Shinnecock? How brutal are the putting surfaces that pushed the cutline to +8 at the 2018 U.S. Open and broke Phil Mickelson so badly he never really recovered? A host of multi-syllabic adjectives\u2014flagellating, inhumane, sadistic\u2014come to mind. Alex Fitzpatrick, however, won\u2019t go quietly. In 2026, he\u2019s fighting back with the power of modern technology \u2026 or something like that.<\/p>\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Some interesting prep from Alex Fitzpatrick to say the least \ud83d\ude05 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/6EUqR3ePg0\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/6EUqR3ePg0<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Golf Channel (@GolfChannel) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/GolfChannel\/status\/2066912312938709186?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">June 16, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<p lang=\"de\" dir=\"ltr\">Checking in on Alex Fitzpatrick: <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/KSzQzPHfqT\" rel=\"nofollow\">pic.twitter.com\/KSzQzPHfqT<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Gabby Herzig (@GabbyHerzig) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/GabbyHerzig\/status\/2066910692041429039?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" rel=\"nofollow\">June 16, 2026<\/a><\/p>\n<p>RELATED: The Jordan Spieth experience is underway at Shinnecock after almost smoking someone in the head during range session<\/p>\n<p>Welcome to the future, folks. We may not have flying cars, but we do have a newly minted PGA Tour pro plugging into the matrix in a desparate attempt not to pound his six-foot par putts 15 yards off the green. Clearly, pros are throwing the kitchen sink at Golf\u2019s Toughest Test\u2122 this week, but Fitzpatrick is going one step farther\u2014he\u2019s wearing it.<\/p>\n<p>How Fitzpatrick\u2019s high-tech strategy conforms with the USGA\u2019s enforcement of green books remains unclear. In 2022, the PGA Tour banned detailed topographical green books. As part of the same addendum, it also broadened the ban on \u201cany device to test the conditions of the putting greens\u201d to include practice greens, practice rounds and pro-ams. Considering all of that, what does Fitzpatrick have going on under the hood? Is he meditating to the sights and sounds of the rain forest? Is he kung-fu fighting Morpheus in a dojo? Is he stalking the streets of Gotham as Batman? We\u2019ll just have to ask him and find out.<\/p>\n<p>RELATED: Your vibes-only guide to the top 41 contenders at Shinnecock Hills<\/p>\n<p>This article was originally published on golfdigest.com<\/p>\n<p>    <script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"How tough are the greens at Shinnecock? How brutal are the putting surfaces that pushed the cutline to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":742717,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[566],"tags":[4225,64,63,755,138747,44,85,76226],"class_list":["post-742716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-article","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-golf","tag-golf-digest","tag-news","tag-sports","tag-the-loop"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=742716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/742716\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/742717"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=742716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=742716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=742716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}