Golf Compendium

In the first round of the 2019 British Open, David Duval carded a score so high that it took a while to figure out what he'd actually shot. It wound up as a 91. Where does that rank among the worst scores in British Open history for an 18-hole round? Unfortunately for Duval, it makes the list.

Have you ever heard of a golf game named "Fairways to Heaven"? It's a game that requires a golfer to hit the fairway with his or her drive, and to do so under pressure because there is money at stake.

Michelle Wie burst onto the international golf scene before she was even a teenager: Her first LPGA Tour appearances happened when she was only 12 years old. From age 12 through age 15, before turning pro, Wie played in 24 LPGA tournaments.

The Dunlop-Southport Tournament (sometimes shortened to just Southport Tournament) was played in England from the early 1930s to the late 1940s. Its champions roster includes many of the top British golfers of the era.

Max Faulkner won a British Open title and more than a dozen top tournaments in the pre-European Tour era of British and Continental golf. He also earned a reputation as an eccentric with antics such as walking on his hands during a tournament.

The major championship of men's professional golf that is played every year in Great Britain (and a couple times in Northern Ireland) is called ... what, exactly? Is it the British Open or The Open Championship? Which is correct? The answer, we say, is this: One name is correct, but both names are good.

James Braid was the first golfer in the history of the oldest major, the Open Championship, to record a sub-70 score for an 18-hole round. In the 1904 British Open, played at Royal St. George's Golf Club, Braid carded a 69 in the third round — the first 18-hole round in the 60s ever in the British Open.

The term "Great Triumvirate," when used in a golf context, refers to the three greatest golfers of the late 19th/early 20th century period who dominated golf in Great Britain: Harry Vardon, J.H. Taylor and James Braid.

Since the British Open was the first pro golf tournament and is the oldest extant golf tournament and oldest major, it's had more than 150 years of accumulating firsts. The first sub-70 round, for example, or the first golfer to win it four times. That's what we're talking about here: All those fascinating firsts in the history of the Open Championship that advanced the tournament, and continue to do so.