Past champions make it an Open for the ages

19 past Australian Open golf champions gather to mark the 100 year celebration of the tournament. Picture: Gregg Porteous

If tournaments can have a theme then the getting of age seems to whirl all about The Australian golf course this week. It is the 100th playing of the Australian Open and past champions covering seven decades were celebrated in a memorable ceremony yesterday.

Maybe it was Peter Senior’s win last week at 56 years old. But age had a bit more respect yesterday. Nineteen winners of the Australian Open were introduced to the crowd. The getting of age meant that some of the former champions barely completed their swings, never mind a hole. Some didn’t swing at all.

Peter Thomson won the first of his three Australian Opens in 1951; Frank Phillips the first of two in 1957. After several questions from host Ian Baker-Finch — “we were born at the wrong time,” joked Thomson — both gentlemen wisely sat in the shade and watched the goings-on.

Each shot was a flick through a chapter of Australia’s sporting history. Jack Newton, who won his Australian Open in 1979, split the fairway with a left-handed drive. Newton lost his right arm when he walked into a propeller as he was about to board a plane at Sydney Airport in 1983. David Graham, inducted into the world golf hall of fame in July this year, hit sweetly. He is the only Australian to win two majors in the US — the PGA and the Open.

Stuart Appleby, the winner in 2001 at the cute but mostly inappropriate Grand Golf Club in Queensland, is only the fifth man to shoot 59 on the US tour. Appleby did it in 2013 and it won him the Greenbrier Classic.

Steve Allan won at Victoria Golf Club in 2002 when the Open was reduced to 54 holes after the greens were ruled unplayable during the scheduled first round. American Rich Beem, who that year had won the US PGA, left the course in disbelief: a golf round abandoned in perfect weather. Allan is 42 but still looks young enough to require a babysitter and not a caddie.

Bob Shearer won his Australian Open 33 years ago in 1982. Peter Fowler one year later. John Senden won at Royal Sydney in 2006, Craig Parry the following year. Parry’s tee-shot yesterday did what it always does. Started left and trickled right, back to the centre of the fairway. He is readying himself for a spot on the US Champions Tour. At 49, he must bide his time for one more year.

Geoff Ogilvy (2010) was introduced with Adam Scott (2009). Both men have won majors in the US.

Ogilvy has a US Open and Scott became the first Australian to win the US Masters. It came in a playoff with Angel Cabrera. They kept coming: Rodger Davis (1986) and two-time winners Robert Allenby (1994, 2005), Greg Chalmers (1998, 2011) and Peter Lonard (2003, 04).

Englishmen Lee Westwood conquered Greg Norman in 1997 to win the Open at Metropolitan. It took Westwood, then 24, four playoff holes to beat Norman, the world No 1. Westwood himself would become No 1 in 2010. Now 42, he has had a messy year personally and his ranking is now in the 50s. At his best he could win this Open.

When it came to Senior, 56 years old yet man of the moment, he celebrated his two wins (1989, 2012) with his best impression of an old man’s swing. With shortened back swing and an even shorter follow-through he hit the ball low and through mid-wicket for a couple. When you have won the Australian Masters just four days earlier, and you are nearer to 60 than 50, you get to set your own protocols.

After last year’s winner Jordan Spieth struck the final blow the 19 Open champions posed for a photograph. It made a picture running over with talent and memories. Three world No 1s (Westwood, Scott and Spieth) and 26 collective Australian Opens.

The highlight, no doubt, was the presence of Graham who is one of the country’s very finest players. That it took the two-time Majors winner until July this year to reach the world hall of fame is damning of that organisation and unfair on Graham.

As the golfers posed for the pictures it was a moving moment for those privileged to watch and the players no doubt felt chuffed to be among their open equals. Said Scott, who has defrosted into an important voice in Australian and world golf: “It was a very nice touch to celebrate the 100th playing today, having quite a lot of former champions there.

“I think it’s nice to just appreciate the great history that this event has and I think for everyone there, we play a lot of golf and it’s a long career and to reflect back on the year you won is certainly a nice feeling and I think every one of us might have done that for a few seconds up there today.”

It was also a reminder that time never uses anything but driver off the tee. Scott won his Open six years ago. “They go quick yeah, they do and I feel like I would love to win this tournament more than once ... (the years) just slip away so you really have to make it happen and I think that’s what I need to do this week, that’s kind of the attitude.

“I’ve got to get out there on the front foot and really make it happen for myself. The field’s too good. There’s too much quality in this field to just kind of back into a win.”

Even Tiger Woods is now of another era. Darren Clarke, winner of the British Open and captain of the Ryder Cup team, said yesterday: “A lot of the young kids in the American (Ryder Cup team) wouldn’t have seen Tiger in his prime, they wouldn’t have played with him in his prime, but they know how good he was and how good his record was.” The getting of age.

Clarke won his British Open in 2011 at Royal St George’s. He is a slim figure now having lost nearly 30 kilograms in weight. Probably through talking. There wasn’t a question he didn’t devour in yesterday’s news conference that was drenched in Ryder Cup questions.

This was a memorable day in Australian golf, this getting of age. One to cherish as the pictures will prove.

The obvious absentees were Gary Player (seven wins), Jack Nicklaus (6), Greg Norman (5). But such was the success of this celebration it will be remembered for those who were there rather than those who were not.