Tiptoeing Through Hell: Playing the U.S. Open on Golf's Most Treacherous Courses [Hardcover]

John Strege (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 7, 2002

Once a year, when the U.S. Open is played, the United States Golf Association picks a course and then modifies it wickedly, so that even the world's best golfers often must scramble to avoid triple-bogeys. "Nobody wins the Open," a player once said. "It wins you."

Now golf writer John Strege reveals how over the past fifty years the USGA has venomously transformed already difficult courses into "monsters." With relish, he also tells what happened to the pros -- Nicklaus, Palmer, Player, Woods, Snead, Hogan, among others -- who hooked shots into the rough, missed putts, and routinely finished over par in this grueling annual competition.

When the 1963 U.S. Open was won with the score of nine over par, Arthur Daley of the New York Times wrote, "Every hacker had to rub his hands in unholy glee at such mass discomfiture." Once again, in this irresistible account, today's golfers can experience the same pleasure.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Strege, a writer for Golf Digest and the author of Tiger: A Biography of Tiger Woods, examines how the United States Golf Association (USGA) has made the U.S. Open a supreme test for top golfers. In golf, unlike many other sports, the test is not only of player against player but of player against the course. With the United States Open, the course is prepared to make any challenge to par a difficult proposition: the layout is lengthened, the fairways narrowed, the greens made faster. And, as if that were not enough, the USGA has been known to employ artifice: the Hinkle tree was an overnight answer to a gap in the trees that allowed Lon Hinkle to play the eighth hole at Inverness by way of the 17th. Strege's book provides a context for understanding the U.S. Open in terms of its yearly change of venue. It is a narrative history, with a cast ranging from Sam Snead to Tiger Woods, that includes flashbacks to the previous year's tournament or to the last Open held at this particular venue. Of particular interest is the chapter on Bethpage Black, in Farmingdale, NY, the first truly public course to host a U.S. Open. Both entertaining and informative, this book belongs on the shelf alongside recent titles like John Feinstein's The Majors: In Pursuit of Golf's Holy Grail and Salvatore Johnson's The Official U.S. Open Almanac. Steven Silkunas, North Wales, PA
Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

In 1951, officials of the U.S. Golf Association (USGA), concerned that new equipment gave modern players an unfair advantage, decided to toughen up Oakland Hills, site of that year's U.S. Open. Ben Hogan tamed the Monster, as Oakland Hills came to be called, but the USGA was just warming up. For the next 50 years, as Strege shows in this fascinating account, the USGA has systematically grown the rough, narrowed the fairways, and dried out the greens on each Open course, turning the national championship into an annual torture chamber. Strege provides all the grisly details, from the absurdly high winning scores (seven over par in 1974) to the unbelievable horror stories (one player, in 1955, lost his ball in the rough, took a penalty, dropped another ball, and then was forced to take another penalty when he couldn't find his ball immediately after dropping it). Golf history fans will love hearing these war stories one more time, and average players will relish the idea of pampered pros making triple bogeys. Bill Ott
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 240 pages
• Publisher: Harper; 1 edition (May 7, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060188642
• ISBN-13: 978-0060188641
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,693,284 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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