Monty: It Should be That Difficult

“The other thing that would be different if I had my time over again was that I would be a lot slimmer. If you look at old footage, I was enormous. I just had nothing left to give come the playoff.” Montgomerie shot 78 and missed sudden death by four strokes.
 
At the 1997 U.S. Open at Congressional Country Club, Montgomerie arrived as one of the favorites, having won the previous week’s European Tour event by five shots. “I was feeling so good about my game that I didn’t even know where the practice ground was,” he says. “I turned up for my first round and thought I’d better ask, so I went through the motions before playing. Then I went out, missed three 4-foot putts in the first four holes, and went on to shoot 65. To this day, Phil Mickelson, my playing partner that day, calls it the best round of golf in a major he has ever seen.”
 
Montgomerie went to bed that night convinced he would win. He still believes it would have happened but for a rain delay the following day. “What happened is that everyone went to the bar,” he says. “When play resumed I committed the cardinal sin of reacting to a fan who shouted something on the 16th tee. That’s the biggest regret I have in golf. It was not just that I lost concentration and bogeyed the next two holes. It was an incident that cost me years of competing in the U.S. Open.
 
“The incident made headlines in the papers, and that’s when I started having problems with American crowds. It wasn’t until my Ryder Cup performances in 2002 and 2004 earned me respect, and I got sympathy following my divorce around the same time, that it all changed, and I actually started enjoying playing in America again.”
 
His positive outlook didn’t result in a different outcome last year at Winged Foot. Montgomerie stood in the 18th fairway, 172 yards from the hole, facing a shot that had become known as his stock-in-trade: a mid-iron to a hole cut on the right of the green.
 
“If I had to play that shot 100 times, 99 of them would finish 10 feet or less to the left of the flag,” he says. “What unnerved me was that my playing partner, Vijay Singh, had hooked his ball into a tent, and it took an age to get a ruling. This is no criticism of Vijay, because I would have done the same, but if I could just have walked up and hit my shot I would have won.
 
“Instead, I had five minutes to kill, and that’s when the doubts crept in. Was it a 6- or 7-iron? In hindsight I should have spent the time swinging a club, keeping my rhythm, and concentrated on making sure I made a full backswing. Instead, when my time came, I was tight, I didn’t complete my backswing, and as soon as I hit it I knew I was in trouble.”
 
He hit a 7-iron slightly heavy, and instead of hitting it 10 feet left of the hole, he missed the green short right, leading to a double bogey. “People don’t realize how easy it is to lose the U.S. Open,” he says. “Look at Mickelson. He was chasing a third major in a row, and one bad swing from him and that all disappeared with a double bogey at the same hole. Look at Padraig Harrington, who needed to finish with three pars to win and had three bogeys.
 
“But you won’t get any rant from me about its unfairness. It should be that difficult to win the U.S. Open. So I’ll come back this year at Oakmont and have
another go. I’ve even looked at the future venues and contemplated whether they suit me. I’ve not given up hope of cracking the difficulties and finishing the winner.”
 
Related links: