Despite being fully exempt for this year’s Genesis Scottish Open – after a T-6 finish last year and a third-place finish in 2022 – Kim still needed some last-minute help to make the field at the Renaissance Club thanks to an honest, but near-costly, mistake.
Scheffler treats Kim like his little brother, and often gives him a hard time – as siblings do. He genuinely believes Kim will be successful on tour for a long time.
Still relatively fresh from a European Ryder Cup debut and gaining his PGA Tour card through his stellar play on the DP World Tour in 2023, Scotland’s Robert MacIntyre has found life in the New World to be so very different and a lot more stressful.
The social highlight of the week has been the Tuesday evening barbecue attended by as many as 70 guests, a figure made up primarily of (possible) Ryder Cup players, caddies, wives and girlfriends.
Links golf is a multi-faceted affair, one that asks an often-dizzying array of questions all the way from driver to putter. That is why so many believe golf in the land where the game began is the ultimate test, both mentally and physically.
Especially in a wind, these links all demand thinking and strategy that goes outside the relatively one-dimensional stuff that is professional golf around the globe.
Australia’s top-ranked male player, Cam Smith, has begun his Scottish links quest with a solid round of two-under-par 68 on day one of the Scottish Open.