By Rob Hodgetts
BBC Sport at Troon |
Tears and heartache will accompany many visits here, and that's just for spectators trying to get a seat in the cherished grandstand.
The opening group of the championship reached the 123-yard tiddler at 0805 BST on Thursday and already the stand was half full.
Fifteen minutes later there was barely a seat to be had.
The small, thin green is surrounded by five cavernous bunkers and a steep bank to the right, and onlookers were treated to virtually every possible scenario within the first 10 groups.
Soon enough, Ernie Els rewarded the early birds with a stunning hole-in-one eagle, seemingly mocking the benign post-dawn conditions.
A silvery-mauve sky with hints of pale blue over the Firth of Clyde and the distant Isle of Arran greeted the opening of the 133rd Open Championship, with the threat of darkening gun-metal grey clouds looming to the north.
The deep bunkers and fairway humps and hollows keep scores at Troon to a respectable number under par. But it is the wind - which generally blows into the teeth of the back nine - that is the course's principal line of defence.
Els' early ace and Gary Evans' albatross on the par-five fourth were shining examples of how scores must be built on the gentler, downwind front nine before any breeze gets up on the notoriously tough homeward stretch.
But as with all links courses there is more than one way to skin a cat. Some players were laying up well short of the burn at 285 yards on the par-four third.
Ryder Cup hero Paul McGinley took the high road - all 379 yards of it - and reached the green with his drive en route to a comfortable birdie. At the Postage Stamp, most players favoured the aerial route to land the ball softly on a receptive green.
But on the eve of the championship Seve Ballesteros, filming for television, proved that class is permanent with a half-swing, head-high punch which settled mere feet away.
The two-man gallery which witnessed the moment of Seve magic made about as much noise as the bleary-eyed hush of the surprisingly large early crowd on Thursday.
The murmurs were briefly lifted by 1973 champion Tom Weiskopf's four shots to get out of a greenside bunker on the first hole following his 0652 BST start.
And any remaining reverie was punctured by the first plane roaring low over the course at 0832 BST, shortly after take off from nearby Prestwick Airport. The first real travelling gallery accompanied the group of Els, 1997 Troon winner Justin Leonard and England's promising youngster Luke Donald.
But the narrow strip of land on which Troon is laid out became more alive as the day wore on, and especially when Woods took the stage on Thursday afternoon.
The grandstand on the Postage Stamp was the ideal venue to savour the world number one's skills.
But the chances of getting a seat there after 0830 were as likely as 1,000-1 shot Weiskopf making it a Troon Open double.
MMIX
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