With the Open Championship Royal Birkdale Golf Club, minus Tiger Woods, beginning in less than eight hours, I have been thinking of ways to prepare for a less than riveting, but must see nonetheless (all the majors are), television event.
Not unlike Wimbledon is to the public park tennis player, the British Open is very unfamiliar territory for the occasional hacker. We will certainly not get a Nadal/Federer type final round showdown without Tiger in the field, but maybe Daly/Van de Velde. That would be fantastic, wouldn't it?
Both events are played on unusual surfaces. Links style golf courses are a little more interesting visually, but grass tennis courts are bonkers aren't they?
Many of the competitors are unheard of, which is okay since their names are unpronounceable anyway. Pray with me for a pairing of Jean-Baptist Gonnet, Prayad Marksaeng, Yoshinobu Tsukada, and Soren Kjeldsen will you? I think I just broke the spell checker.
Both events have enough potential film footage to replace a year's worth of infomercials on the Golf Channel. All right, I got a little carried away with that one. How many hours is 23 x 7 x 365 anyway?
Speaking of the Golf Channel, it still is the only non-pay per view, one sport channel in existence. Shocking considering how difficult it is to remain interested in a full event.
Television broadcasting of golf has many 10 percent fans. They watch golf 10 percent of the time, only if Tiger Woods is in contention on Sunday. The other 90 percent of the time they only tune-in for the soothing voice of Peter Aliss during an afternoon nap.
My first suggestion for watching the Open Championship is to record it. You can skip all commercials, insignificant interviews, un-interesting player introduction pieces, meaningless first tee shots, tap-ins for par, basically the entire tournament.
DVR has incredibly made watching this type of broadcast possible. If you don't have it, make a tee-time at the local municipal course and pretend you're Tom Watson.
The fact that the first group of players tee-off at 1:30am EST Thursday morning will help convince you to set your TiVo, otherwise during commercials you will be channel surfing between Making Millions in Real Estate Investing, Extenze, and Girls Gone Wild Infomercials.
I on the other hand, will be watching it live, but only because I am such a die-hard golf aficionado.
My second suggestion for enjoying the Open Championship is to get into character. Pick up a tweed Hogan cap, plaid pants, an argyle sweater, some bratwurst and a case of Guinness.
You should also remove all of your dental work and replace your usual profanities with the word "bloody." It helps if you ask your wife to only address you as "the honorable old chap from Mustyberger On Gouda" for the remainder of the weekend. For really serious fans, rent a wind machine, sit in the backyard with the sprinklers on, and watch through window.
Finally, (this is the serious part) try to learn something from the players' golf swings. DVR is great for slow motion.
Choose a player with a similar build as you are, women should pick Colin Montgomerie, and watch closely. Then compare to your own swing in a mirror.
You will notice that when the wind starts blowin' the swings start slowin'. You will also be able to recognize which player is confident and relaxed and which player can't stand still or stop the nervous chatter to his caddy while waiting to hit a shot.
As has been said 2,849,876,238 times before, golf is a mental game, but ABC has no "brain cam" yet. So to really enjoy this year's Open Championship I will be turning off the sound from the commentators on my television and turning on a good polka.
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