Golf

2024 Open Championship: Xander Schauffele Trumps Justin Rose in Battle of Olympic Champions

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Jul 25, 2024 / 8186 Views

Evan Walker

The 2024 Open Championship has set the stage for Paris, and there couldn’t have been a better buildup to the week of golf action at the Summer Olympics in early August. Going with the flow, the script on Sunday, July 21, at the Royal Troon Golf Club featured two Olympic gold medallists, Xander Schauffele and Justin Rose, in the tussle for the Claret Jug, the winner’s takeaway at the Open Championship.

When the script concluded, Schauffele heralded his second Major win in two months after taming all that a Scottish links course hurls at Golfers with full force — brutal weather, challenging layout and the battle of nerves with the two-shot win over Rose and Billy Horschel.

At 43, Rose remains the fierce comPetitor he was when he last won a Major at the 2013 US Open, and through the week at Troon there were numerous instances when the Briton, who made History in Golf’s comeback at the Olympics after 1904 with gold at Rio De Janeiro 2016, showed he had the wherewithal to become the season’s first non-American winner of a Major.

That was not to be as Schauffele made it a perfect 4-in-4 read for his country, and in the process threw the gauntlet heading to Paris’ Le Golf National as the champion from Tokyo 2020.

2024 Open Championship: Xander Schauffele takes the lead

Time-tested method

This is a phase of redemption for Schauffele. After the string of wins on the PGA Tour in 2022, the strong finishes is proof that the 30-year-old kept contending with unfailing regularity, but the inability to convert the starts into a win got him the ‘bridesmaid’ tag.

It hurt, but Schauffele was willing to wait. Among the golf lessons his father, Stefan, had handed down over time was to “commit, execute and accept” the outcome. The near misses since the 2022 Genesis Scottish Open triumph had Schauffele licking his wounds, but he also took responsibility for what led to the poor shots and the inability to close out tournaments.

Getting ahead of himself in anticipation on the final back-nine of tournaments was one more stumbling block, which Schauffele owned up to. It called for a trigger, and Schauffele had quite a few this 2024 season. Finishing second-best to Scottie Scheffler at the Players Championship, and Rory McIlroy at Wells Fargo handed big doses of acceptance, but also steeled the comPetitor in him.

Like the saying, ‘you can’t keep a good man down’, Schauffele learnt in a way that he stormed the Major stage twice in the space of two months, and the heartbreaks and brickbats were the buildup to his career’s biggest phase.

The champion avoided the roadblocks at Valhalla (PGA Championship) and now at Royal Troon. In fact, Schauffele seems to have got better at it. Unlike the close call at the PGA Championship, Schauffele used Sunday’s back-nine to break free of Rose and Horschel and finish two shots clear at 9-under 275 (69, 72, 69, 65) on the back of a flawless sign-off.

“I think winning the [PGA Championship] helped me a lot [on Sunday] on the back nine. I had some feeling of calmness come through. It was very helpful on what has been one of the hardest back nines I’ve ever played in a tournament,” he said.

Papa Stefan wasn’t around to see his boy tick the to-do list in Valhalla, but was on hand at Royal Troon, and that was a relief for Schauffele as he “reeled himself in” and made sure his expectations were in sync with on-ground reality.

The transition from contender to champion is complete, and Schauffele, the new World No 2, is also the best bet to challenge World No 1 Scottie Scheffler’s seemingly unbridled supremacy in the race to the PGA Tour’s FedExCup champion. The gap between the two is 1936 FedExCup points — Scheffler’s 5993 to Schauffele’s 4057, but with the FedExCup playoffs less than a month away, the possibilities are immense.

Milestone man

The road to greatness in the toughest of conditions in world golf is financially rewarding, but along with the Open’s top cheque of USD 3.1 million, Schauffele notched quite a few milestones with his ninth career win on Tour.

After Brooks Koepka (2018 US Open, 2018 PGA Championship), Schauffele is the first to win multiple Majors in a calendar year, and also the first to win the PGA Championship and Open in the same season since Rory McIlroy in 2014.

Completing the task also ensured Schauffele will end the 2024 season as the only player to post top-10s in the season’s all four Majors, T8 at the Masters, PGA Championship win, T7 at the US Open, and the 2024 Open Championship triumph.

Competitor to the core

Right through the week, Justin Rose stayed in the mix, showing the swelling crowds his love for links golf, and the appetite to add to the lone Major win.

With a win on Sunday, Rose would have set the longest span between victories in the history of Major championships with 4053 days since the high at the 2013 US Open.

Rose fell short in his endeavour to become the fourth oldest Open champion, but his dignity was the perfect camouflage to the disappointment.

Acknowledging he lost to the better player on the day, Rose was effusive. “A guy that has all the attributes that make him a great player and champion. He’s now learning that the winning is easy… He’s got a lot of weapons out there but one of his most unappreciated ones is his mentality. He’s such a calm guy out there, he certainly makes it look very easy.”

Plenty of positives

In the battle of generations between Schauffele and Rose on Sunday, Billy Horschel was the other angle of the prism, and one with the ability to determine a tournament’s course.

Through the week leading to Sunday, Horschel held the 54-hole lead and looked good for his maiden Major triumph, and his best finish in 43 starts in Majors since the T4 at the 2013 US Open.

The fighter that he is, Horschel turned up to compete the final 18 holes, and did well too with the round of 3-under 71. But the three dropped shots through the day came to matter in the score recorders’ enclosure.

Over time, Horschel has been open about with his battles on and off the golf course, and there was no holding back this time as well.

“I’m disappointed. I should feel disappointed. I had a chance to win a Major. I just made a few too many mistakes when I didn’t need to. But we’ll look back on this in an hour, I’ll be very happy with how I played, with what I did this week.

“I did a lot of great things that I can take on to the next few years of Majors, and hopefully one of these will be my time to step through the door and hold one of them,” he said.

The words need to be studied closely, for here is man who refused to give up. Horschel picked himself up from the depths of gloom to win again this season, the Corales Puntacana Championship, after a gap, and the T2 finish in Scotland is a tribute to his spirit. “It’s what’s in my DNA… I’m going to always fight, always going to battle until the end.”

Tearful in triumph

Despite the three-shot cushion on the 18th as the leading amateur at Royal Troon, Calum Scott was in a quandary. His caddie and coach had advised him to soak in the walk to the green, and Smith did so, but he was worried at the same time as the putt had to be made without further damage to the day’s already over-par round of 76.

The mixture of emotions got to the 20-year-old Scot, and he made par with moist eyes. Receiving the Silver Medal for the best amateur, Scott put the week in perspective, which ended with a score of 8-over 292 (71, 75, 70, 76).

“It is one of the highest honours you can win as an amateur. To be able to make the cut, and to beat out 11 other amateurs, I am very proud of myself for that and to compete in a tournament like The Open is just amazing,” said the student of Texas Tech.

(Main and featured images: The Open Championship/ Instagram)