Oakmont is drying out, and the U.S. Open will only get harder

OAKMONT, Pa. – The golf course at Oakmont Country Club absorbed 1.1 inches of rain overnight before the U.S. Open started here on Thursday, then 2.97 inches between Thursday and Friday morning. The rainfall delayed first-round play overnight on Thursday, but it offered a silver lining for the players by softening the course and abiding lower scores.

That benefit should be just about gone by Sunday afternoon when the leaders tee off in the final round. The tournament proceeded under gorgeous conditions for a second straight day on Saturday, and the water that drenched the course throughout Thursday can now only be found in mud along spectator walkways.

“One thing about Oakmont: It drains very, very well,” course archivist Gerry Hickel said in an interview Saturday. “It can pour like it did on Thursday and you can see puddles on the greens, and 10 minutes later, they’re gone.”

During the championship’s second round — conducted in the closest aftermath to Thursday’s rainstorms and finished Saturday at lunchtime — players attacked the course unlike at any time in the past two U.S. Opens here. They made 396 birdies after 284 in the first round, as greens and fairways invited golf balls to stop on them.

The course looked like a waterpark Thursday afternoon, and it played differently than Oakmont is, by nature, expected to play.

“Completely different golf course than we played in the practice round,” Jordan Spieth said Thursday after his partial first round. “I mean, night and day.”

But now the course looks immaculate, and its greens and fairways are running noticeably quicker. By the time players were finishing their second rounds on Saturday, the course was ratcheting up in difficulty, albeit slowly and surely.

“Not much different. It’s still receptive,” Bryson DeChambeau said after carding a 1-over 141 through 36 holes. “There are a few holes where it’s bouncing a little bit more and we’re not used to that. Comparative to when it rained, when we went right back out, it was spinning like crazy.”

Saturday was all sun, and Sunday is likely to bring more of the same. This was a damp golf course in the midst of three weather delays on Thursday and for much of Friday, too, but now it’s firmed up considerably.

But that might not mean exactly what it seems.

“Through my experience, the rain doesn’t really affect the speed of the greens and the putts,” Hickel said. “It affects more the softness of the greens, and that makes it a little easier, especially for these pros, to get the ball closer to the hole.”

Not that pitching the ball to the green was easy at any point, though. After the first of three Thursday weather delays, Spieth played what appeared to be a lovely wedge from the 17th fairway toward the green, landing it 10 yards behind the flagstick and spinning it toward the pin. But the ball never stopped, and it rolled into a bunker.

There’s never an easy time to execute your short game at Oakmont, but as the course dries out more, doing it will get even harder. It’s also likely that Oakmont’s fairways will feed more directly into some of its many fairway bunkers, putting aim at an even greater premium. When Oakmont is churning, even a safe-looking fairway drive can creep off into the sand.

Six players finished the third round under par. It’ll be surprising and remarkably impressive if that number gets bigger by Sunday night.

“The course, certainly, if it gets more firm, becomes a little bit more difficult to have control of your golf ball in and around the greens,” said Charlie Howe, the USGA’s championship manager for the event. “But these are the best players in the world. They’ve had many opportunities to play Oakmont here this week, and we’ll see. It’s gonna be an exciting weekend.”