Royal Birkdale

Lore & Background

Founded in 1889 as Birkdale Golf Club, the club was awarded 'Royal' status in 1951. Birkdale Golf Club moved to a new site in Birkdale Hills in 1897, and a new distinctive art deco clubhouse was built in 1935. In early 1939, Birkdale was nominated as the venue for the 1940 Open Championship but the Second World War started in September 1939 and the Championship was cancelled. In 1946, the club finally hosted its first big championship, the Amateur Championship, won by Irishman Jimmy Bruen. During the immediate postwar era, the club also hosted the 1948 Curtis Cup and the 1951 Walker Cup, both won by the United States. With these successful stagings of important events, Royal Birkdale was felt to be ready for its first Open Championship in 1954 and has continued on the Open rota ever since. Three generations of the Hawtree family of golf course architects have worked on the course. Frederick G. Hawtree and champion golfer J.H. Taylor are the two people most responsible for the current routing, following the valleys between the very large dunes which dominate the property. The arrangement makes for excellent spectator conditions during major events. Frederick W. Hawtree, the son of Frederick G, performed some modifications in the 1960s and in 1993 Martin Hawtree, son of Frederick W., improved and modernised the layout further, with all 18 of the club's greens being completely rebuilt, to improve turf and drainage following the 1991 Open Championship. Only relatively minor tweaking, such as the addition of a few new bunkers and back tees, has been deemed necessary in advance of the last two Open Championships. The course was ranked as the 18th-best in the world outside the United States, in the 2007 rankings by Golf Digest magazine. During the 1960s, the club hosted the Ryder Cup twice, in 1965 and in 1969. The United States won in 1965 by the score of 19½–12½, but in 1969 the competition ended in a 16–16 tie when Jack Nicklaus generously conceded a short putt to Tony Jacklin to halve their match, which later became known as 'The Concession'. As defending champions in a tie, the U.S. retained the trophy; they kept it for another sixteen years, until 1985. In 2013, the club hosted the Senior Open Championship.

In Their Own Story

The wind finds the 14th fairway before the ball does. You can hear it in the gorse, a low moan that shifts pitch as it funnels between the dunes. The caddie adjusts the flagstick's angle a fraction of a degree and says nothing. He doesn't need to. You both know that the pin is a suggestion, not a command, out here where the Irish Sea has been rewriting the rules since before the first tee was ever mown.

You grip the seven-iron a little tighter. The ball sits on turf that feels less like grass and more like compacted sand with a thin green skin. Your swing is a compact, controlled motion—nothing fancy, nothing that invites the wind to take a second look. The ball drops, checks, and rolls with a soft, almost apologetic thud toward the green. The crowd on the dune ridge exhales as one. Somewhere out past the 18th, the sea is doing what it has always done: erasing, reshaping, reminding everyone that this course belongs to the weather first and to the golfer second.

Reader's Guide

The Open Championship was first held at Royal Birkdale in 1954 and has hosted eleven times. Winners of the Open at the course include Pádraig Harrington, Mark O'Meara, Ian Baker-Finch, Tom Watson, Johnny Miller, Lee Trevino, Arnold Palmer, Peter Thomson (twice), Jordan Spieth, and Ryan Fox. The course has also hosted the Women's British Open, the Senior Open Championship, the Ryder Cup, the Walker Cup, and the Curtis Cup. On 22 July 2017, in the third round of the 2017 Open Championship, Branden Grace became the first man in major championship history to record a score of 62 in a single round.

Did You Know?

• Royal Birkdale was awarded 'Royal' status in 1951.
• The club hosted its first Open Championship in 1954.
• Branden Grace shot a 62 in the third round of the 2017 Open Championship at Royal Birkdale, the first 62 in major championship history.
• The 1969 Ryder Cup at Royal Birkdale ended in a 16–16 tie, with Jack Nicklaus conceding a short putt to Tony Jacklin, known as 'The Concession'.