Royal Troon showed its teeth on Day 1, letting the brilliant unpredictability of links golf shine brightly.
A pair of major champions struggling on the greens this season were among the best in the field putting in Round 1. The two key protagonists in the last major looked like shells of themselves. And how about an unheralded player making his first major start taking the outright lead?
Here are the top numbers and notes to know from Round 1 of the 152nd Open Championship.
1. So you want to prognosticate pro golf? Daniel Brown entered this week with either a missed cut or withdrawal in seven of his previous eight starts on the DP World Tour. At age 29, the Englishman had not only never played in an Open, but in any major. Then Thursday, he did something truly unprecedented.
Brown (65, -6) became the first player in men’s professional golf history to shoot a bogey-free round of 65 or lower in his debut major championship round.
Brown blistered it off the tee, gaining a field-best 3.5 strokes driving. He also grossly outperformed his season average on the green, gaining nearly 4.5 strokes putting. This season on the DP World Tour, he ranks 96th in that metric (-0.17 per round).
It’s the second consecutive year that the first-round leader at The Open was making his major debut. Last year, amateur Christo Lamprecht shot a first-round 66 to co-lead before ultimately finishing in a tie for 74th place.
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2. Shane Lowry left Royal Portrush in 2019 with the Claret Jug in hand. He would like to return it there next year when The Open comes back.
Lowry’s 66 is his lowest opening-round score in a major championship. It’s the sixth time he’s recorded a bogey-free round in a major, and his first at The Open since Round 3 of his victory at Portrush. Lowry kept his round together early with clutch saves, making five par putts of 6 feet or longer in the first 12 holes. Lowry gained 4.74 strokes putting on the field Thursday, most of any player in the field.
Since that win at Portrush, the opening round of majors had been a bit of a drag on Lowry’s overall performance. Since the beginning of 2020, Lowry was a combined 16-over-par in Round 1 of major championships, scrambling at a rate of just over 50 percent. Today he was 6-of-6 getting up-and-down, the most of any player without a dropped shot in those opportunities.
Justin Thomas was the leader after the morning wave Thursday. (Andrew Redington / Getty Images)
3. On a golf course that demands precise iron play and short-game creativity, Justin Thomas (68, -3) is part of a small group of players that checks those two statistical boxes in 2024. Thomas entered the week ranked in the top 20 in both strokes gained approach and strokes gained around the green per round, something only Scottie Scheffler and Tony Finau can also claim.
While Thomas did pick up strokes Thursday both approaching and around the greens, it was a lights-out putting performance that truly carried the day. Thomas went 5-for-6 putting from 10 to 20 feet, gaining more than three full strokes on the field on the greens alone. That’s a stark difference from what JT has done in 2024 on the PGA Tour: -0.40 per round, outside the top 150 among qualified players.
A week ago at the Scottish Open, Thomas opened with a brilliant 62, but shot a score 10 shots higher the following day and faded from contention. Can he back up his excellent start with something stronger Friday?
4. Reigning PGA champ Xander Schauffele headlines a large collection of players at 2-under. It was another full-bag performance from the balanced Schauffele, who gained shots in each of the skill-specific strokes gained categories in Round 1. Schauffele, who has finished in the top 20 in 10 straight major starts, will try to become the first player to win The Open and PGA Championship in the same season in 10 years (Rory McIlroy).
Justin Rose (-2) hit 14 of 18 greens in regulation to record the third bogey-free round of his Open Championship career. Rose has been all-or-nothing recently in majors, either missing the cut (four times) or finishing in the top 10 (twice) in his last six starts. The best Open finish in his distinguished career is a tie for second place six years ago at Carnoustie.
5. World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler is firmly in the conversation after an opening 1-under-par 70. To absolutely nobody’s surprise, Scheffler’s ball-striking numbers were exquisite: he picked up nearly five shots on the field with his drives and approaches on Thursday. When Scottie won the Travelers last month, he became the first player to reach six wins in a PGA Tour season before July 1 since Arnold Palmer in 1962. Palmer’s seventh win that season came in The Open at Royal Troon.
Brooks Koepka also opened with 70, the seventh time in 10 career Open starts he’s begun the week with a round under par. Four of Koepka’s five birdies on Thursday came in succession on holes four through eight, buoying the ship after bogeys at two and three. Koepka has 51 rounds in majors with at least five birdies since 2015, second to only Jordan Spieth in that span (55).
6. Royal Troon played to an average of 74.44 shots on Day 1, the most difficult opening round in an Open Championship since 11 years ago at Muirfield. It’s more than 2.1 strokes higher than the first round here eight years ago, when Phil Mickelson flirted with 62 and 50 players broke par. Just 17 shot under par on Thursday.
Eagle on 16 for Jordan Spieth. pic.twitter.com/MCRRk2KHYa
— The Open (@TheOpen) July 18, 2024
7. U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau has struggled to unlock the keys to Open Championship success so far in his career. That continued on Thursday, as DeChambeau hit just eight greens in regulation in an opening round 76. Since 2016, DeChambeau’s strokes gained per round average in the Masters, U.S. Open and PGA combined is +1.40. At The Open, it’s just +0.10.
DeChambeau’s approach play and putting have been brilliant in the majors so far this year, as he gained nearly a full shot in each category entering this week. He lost well over a shot-and-a-half to the field in each statistic on Thursday. DeChambeau’s unique scorecard had an eagle, no birdies and six bogeys – the first time that has happened at The Open in 11 years.
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8. Rory McIlroy shot a disappointing 78, his highest score in a major championship since the first round of The Open at Royal Portrush in 2019 (79). Rory carded just one birdie, his fewest in an Open round since 2012 at Royal Lytham. He hit just seven greens in regulation and lost well over a stroke to the field with both his ball striking and putting.
It’s been 124 years since a player shot 78 or higher in the first round and won The Open, so it’s safe to assume that McIlroy’s major-less drought will hit a full 10 seasons on Sunday. McIlroy has 21 top-10 finishes in the majors since the beginning of the 2015 season, the most for any player in a 10-year-span without winning in men’s major championship history.
9. Nineteen-year-old amateur Jaime Montojo will have some stories to tell about summer break when he gets back to Texas A&M. Montojo, who earned medalist honors in final qualifying at Royal Cinque Ports, started his Open Championship career with an eagle two on the opening hole. Over the last 30 years (as far back as The Open hole-by-hole data is reliable), Montojo is the only player to make eagle on the first hole they have ever played in The Open.
It’s also Montojo’s debut across all the majors, but you don’t have to go back nearly as far to find the last player to make that debut with an eagle. At the 2020 U.S. Open at Winged Foot, amateur Eduard Rousaud made a 2 on the opening par 4 in Round 1 what was his first major played.
10. The leaderboard is undeniably bunched near the top, but there are a few historic trends that help cross off names when looking for a potential winner. Each of the last 24 Open champions have been within five strokes of the lead after the opening round. Since 1960, 87 percent of winners have been within four shots.
The largest Round 1 deficit overcome to win an Open was 11 strokes by Harry Vardon in 1896. The largest in the last 50 years is eight shots by Seve Ballesteros in 1979.
(Top photo of Daniel Brown: Andy Buchanan / AFP via Getty Images)
