With the WM Phoenix Open being held on Super Bowl week in Arizona, and having just been given a boost by the PGA Tour to bring the best players in the world for a bumper prize pot, it seemed the perfect time to check it out on the ground.
“I think if I wasn’t a player and I wanted to come to one PGA Tour event, this would probably be the one that I’d want to come to,” said Rory McIlroy as he made a rare appearance at the WM Phoenix Open – where the fans were definitely glad he made the effort.
It’s the rowdiest, loudest, most popular stop on the PGA Tour, and being held in the same week as the Super Bowl just takes the feverish atmosphere to another level. Talk about this being an elevated event!
Once you’ve finally found your way to the car park in the vast area of desert just north of Phoenix, once you’ve then found your way through the massed ranks of fans walking in five different directions, and once you’ve cleared security and actually entered TPC Scottsdale, you’re immediately aware that this is not you average PGA Tour event.
It’s golf, but not like we know it! The hum of the crowd builds the nearer you get, the increasing number of huge stands at various holes dominate the landscape, and most dominant of all is huge behemoth that is the stadium surrounding the infamous 16th hole.
“The loudest hole in golf” it proudly proclaims just outside this golfing colosseum, and they’re not lying. The noise is bewildering, intimidating and totally mind-boggling to anyone who has been to any other golf tournament – even Majors and Ryder Cups.
Is the Phoenix Open good for golf?
The smoky smell of barbeque wafts around TPC Scottsdale along with more than a hint of stale beer if you enter one of the stands later on in the day, when many fans are well on their way to being on the merrier side, but in general the atmosphere is pretty good – jovial by and large.
The noise is a constant though, and the ears are left buzzing after a day out on the course as the underlying tones of the thousands and thousands of well-oiled fans just doesn’t stop.
Is it good for golf? That’s the big question usually asked when this event rolls around and, look, those scenes last year of beer cans being thrown onto the green were ones nobody wants to see – much like this year’s streaker and last year’s shirtless Harry Higgs..
But tone that down slightly and what you do have are thousands of people, whether some know it or not, attending a golf tournament….
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