{"id":796762,"date":"2026-07-12T08:51:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-12T08:51:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/796762\/"},"modified":"2026-07-12T08:51:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-12T08:51:15","slug":"improved-royal-birkdale-ready-to-test-the-worlds-best-at-the-open-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/796762\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Improved\u2019 Royal Birkdale ready to test the world\u2019s best at The Open \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Even natural masterpieces can benefit from some brush strokes. In the case of Royal Birkdale, the links on England\u2019s western seaboard that hosts the 154th Open Championship<\/a>, has involved a number of changes since Jordan Spieth lifted the Claret Jug back in 2017.<\/p>\n

The go-to course renovators for the R&A in recent times are the architectural team of Mackenzie & Ebert \u2013 fronted by Tom Mackenzie and Martin Ebert \u2013 and every single hole has had some work conducted in a project which commenced in May 2024, with two totally new holes added to the layout.<\/p>\n

The most notable changes for the 11th staging of golf\u2019s oldest Major championship at Birkdale involved the complete redesign of the par 4 fifth hole, while the old 14th has gone (converted to a practice area) so that old 15th \u2013 lengthened to a par 5 of 602 yards \u2013 has moved to become the 14th. A completely new par 3, the 15th, is 240 yards on the scorecard in the most significant of the moving and shaking.<\/p>\n

Of the new hole, the longest par 3 at Birkdale, Mackenzie observed: \u201c[The aim is to encourage] shots to be dropped short or just on the front edge and running up the green which falls away softly to the back … it will often play downwind. Expect to see players hitting long irons or more, depending on the conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Not that Rory McIlroy, who paid an advance reconnaissance visit recently, exactly saw it that way. The Northern Irishman\u2019s take was that he was \u201cundecided\u201d about the new creation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere may be a couple of holes locations on the green where the hole is a little bit too long for those hole locations,\u201d McIlroy said. \u201cIt\u2019s maybe a little bit silly to be hitting a 3-iron into some of them. But if they moved up the tee box where you\u2019re hitting like a 6- or 7-iron in, it\u2019s good. But it\u2019s going to be an interesting hole. I think it\u2019s going to be a big talking point during the week.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AnAn aerial view of the second shot on the 322-yard par 4, fifth hole at Royal Birkdale. Photograph: David Cannon\/Getty <\/p>\n

While the club members-led renovation project involved adjustments to fairway bunkering that included addressing historical drainage issues, rebuilding almost all of the tees and developing closely mown green surrounds, the other notable change came with the reimagining of the fifth hole which will potentially play as a drivable risk-reward par 4 of 320 yards.<\/p>\n

A new fifth green was shifted left so that it is now more visible off the tee with a large bunker to the left of the fairway and a number of bunkers protecting the right, where the rough has been lowered to create a dune slack \u2013 a damp, wet area \u2013 that is unlikely to be in play.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is now a genuinely drivable short par 4, compared to a hole that was previously forgettable and widely recognised as the weakest on the course,\u201d said Mackenzie. \u201cSome [players] will have a go at trying to drive the green and may only need a 3-wood, while there are multiple lay-up options for those who decide not to. As a spectator, it is also greatly improved, and it will be exciting to see how the world\u2019s best choose to play it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Old photos were also used to restore the vision of JH Taylor, a former Open champion, and Fred G Hawtree, who planned the old championship routing. This was true of the 11th, where an historical aerial photography showed an enormous cross-bunker beyond the landing area and inspired rebunkering work. It also helped at the 17th, where according to Mackenzie, \u201cphotos inspired the restoration of the sandy areas that are now set into the face of the dune on the left of the drive, with another right of the approach.\u201d<\/p>\n

The course for this latest visit of The Open to Royal Birkdale will play to a length of 7,223 yards \u2013 just 67 yards longer than it was in 2017 when Spieth won \u2013 and a par of 70, with each of the 156 players looking to add their name to a roll of honour that features past winners of Peter Thomson (1954), Arnold Palmer (1961), Lee Trevino (1971), Johnny Miller (1976), Tom Watson (1983), Ian Baker Finch (1991), Mark O\u2019Meara (1998), P\u00e1draig Harrington (2008) and most recently Spieth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Even natural masterpieces can benefit from some brush strokes. In the case of Royal Birkdale, the links on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":796763,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,8423,1978,1976,82],"class_list":["post-796762","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-golf","tag-open-championship","tag-padraig-harrington","tag-rory-mcilroy","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/796762","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=796762"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/796762\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/796763"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=796762"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=796762"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=796762"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}