Oliver Lindell faces the biggest competition of his career – the major debutant is not going to be intimidated
Oliver Lindell is currently preparing for his first major start, The Open at Royal Portrush, which begins on Thursday. He has familiarised himself thoroughly with the course by playing 27 holes and walking around the course with his caddie, Emil Markus. Preparations for the biggest competition of his career have gone well.
Lindell is in a comfortable position to start the competition without any major pressure. Practically all of the 156 hottest golf stars of the moment will be at the starting line, and even making the cut would be a huge achievement for the Finn. However, the Porvoo native is not approaching the competition with humility; his goal is to play a solid and successful tournament, which his current form makes entirely possible.
"With a top performance, a top 10 finish is definitely possible, but let's start with the goal of playing all four rounds. I'm not here to kiss anyone's boots, even though there are some tough players on the line. I'm just focused on my own preparation for the competition."
Lindell already got to familiarise himself with the course during the practice rounds, playing alongside Viktor Hovland, ranked 11th in the world, Sebastian Söderberg and Kristoffer Reitan, who has become well known this season. Norwegian superstar Hovland is a familiar competitor from a decade ago in junior Olympic golf, where the Norwegian finished fourth – one place ahead of Lindell, the Finn recalled. Hovland was mainly responsible for signing autographs during the practice round, but Lindell also got to sign a few at the beginning of the week.
"It seems that even us regulars are being asked for autographs – I've had to sign quite a few. On Tuesday, I was able to take it easy on the front nine, as Hovland took care of things for me. There have been far more spectators on the practice days than at any other tournament in my career," Lindell enthuses.
There are only 62 bunkers in total on the Royal Portrush course, but the reason they are talked about so much is because they are so treacherous. They are pot-shaped, deep and fairly small. The probability of ending up close to the wall in a small bunker is high, although the shape of the bunkers often takes the ball to the bottom, to the centre. The sand traps at Royal Portrush tend to "suck" balls in, making them appear larger than their actual size.
In addition to bunkers, you need to be careful with the "sand dunes" if your shot strays from the fairway. The elevation changes, variable winds and steep sand mounds make the course challenging.
"It's a great arena, and you can already feel the atmosphere even before the competition has started. There are so many people here that it's much bigger than I could have imagined. The wind direction has a big impact on which fairways are easy and which are difficult. A north wind makes the early holes difficult, but the later ones easy. Yesterday, I hit the green on the 17th hole (par 4) when the ball went downhill 375 metres," Lindell said of the course.
"You have to be careful off the tee, because if you hit it too far to the left, you'll hit long grass and the ball will start rolling. The greens here are quite slow, but that's partly due to the strength of the wind. There are hardly any water hazards on the course."
Lindell will tee off on Thursday at 13:04 Finnish time, together with Justin Suh from the United States and Jesper Sandborg from Sweden.