{"id":382863,"date":"2026-04-05T08:20:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T08:20:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/382863\/"},"modified":"2026-04-05T08:20:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T08:20:09","slug":"paul-kimmage-how-the-masters-showed-me-golf-as-the-ultimate-bloodsport-compelling-and-brutal-and-cruel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/382863\/","title":{"rendered":"Paul Kimmage: How the Masters showed me golf as the ultimate bloodsport \u2013 compelling and brutal and cruel"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"P\u00e1draig Harrington plays a shot from a bunker on the second hole during a practice round prior to the Masters at Augusta National Golf Club in April 2022. Photo: Andrew Redington\/Getty Images\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/763324b2-86be-4c73-9435-a8e149fc517f.jpg\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"100%\" data-testid=\"article-image\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_caption1 indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_secondary indo-66f0fec7_regular indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop3 indo-b48c4984_left\" style=\"color:var(--color-grey-60)\">P\u00e1draig Harrington plays a shot from a bunker on the second hole during a practice round prior to the Masters at Augusta National Golf Club in April 2022. Photo: Andrew Redington\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Augusta raised the drawbridge yesterday. For two days there was an open invitation to attack its defences but yesterday it was only those who dared that managed to get under par. One was all the way leader Greg Norman. A display of real class over the last six left his pursuers floundering in his slipstream; not alone did he retain the lead but extended it from four shots to six with Nick Faldo still in second place.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">Even the Great White Shark could hardly contrive to let this one slip from his jaws. The Aussie\u2019s record is not the greatest when leading Majors into the final round. Six times he has gone to bed with the third round lead (once tied) and only managed to win one, the 1986 British Open.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"P\u00e1draig Harrington plays a shot from a bunker on the second hole during a practice round prior to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":382864,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,39065,42965,1394,112,170752],"class_list":{"0":"post-382863","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-ie","9":"tag-ireland","10":"tag-padraig-harrington","11":"tag-paul-kimmage","12":"tag-rory-mcilroy","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-us-masters"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/382864"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}