RUSH: I just got an email. “Rush, I’m watching the U.S. Open. It looks really cold out there.” It is. It’s like 55 degrees. Not a whole lot of wind, which helps, but it’s chilly, 55, Pebble Beach, Monterey Peninsula. Chilly out there it is. It’s a public course, yeah, anybody, you go there and stay, you can play. It costs a pretty penny, but you can go there and lodge, great rooms.
You gotta reserve a spot. I mean, it’s always busy. You can even drive a cart on it. Yeah, it’s a public course. It’s owned by Arnold Palmer — well, his estate now. A bunch of people came in and bought it, a bunch of big-time golf people, and they have a board of directors that runs it, but it’s always been public. Spyglass is public. Poppy Hills is pubic.
You go down the road to Cypress Point, that’s not. Cypress Point, you have to get permission to be seen within 10 miles of the place. But, all these others, they’re public. And, really, if you play golf and you haven’t played Pebble Beach, I’m sure you’ll want to. It’s that well known. The vistas there are – particularly, that course to me begins on the seventh hole. Well, six. Six is marvelous.
But 8 through 13, those holes have the great views and vistas, and, of course, 17 and 18, 18 the finishing hole. They also happen to be the hardest holes, numbers 8 through 12, 13, 14 — well, yeah, all the way through 15. There’s not an easy one there. Even the short 105-yard par 3 number 7, depending on the wind, you know, most people will hit a sand wedge, maybe a gap wedge.
But I heard Curtis Strange say yesterday he one time during a tournament there had to hit a 6-iron. Now, those guys hit a 6-iron 200 yards, 205 yards. And the wind was in the face so strong, he had a 6-iron to get it to land on the green a hundred yards away. But the pin placement on that green makes hundred yards, that’s an automatic par. No, it’s surrounded by bunkers and the pin placements are really tough. But, no, it is chilly. It was chilly at Shinnecock last summer for the U.S. Open out in Long Island, and I guess it’s global warming.
Related Links