On the eve of the championship, Jim McArthur, Chairman of the R&A’s Championship Committee, said, “Though we will be taking conditions into account, we have a pace of play policy which we intend to apply stringently.
“We give each group a time schedule for each hole and we monitor that all the time. If a group is out of position or over the time schedule, we start with words of encouragement and, if they don’t respond to those, we put them on the clock. A second bad time would precipitate a one-stroke penalty.”
Three groups were on the clock on the first day, with one player the concerned recipient off a first ‘bad time’.
The trio of Brad Kennedy, Mardan Mamat and Steve Tiley were among those on the clock as they visited a total of 14 bunkers.
Steve Mason, the green-keeper doing the bunker-raking for the party, must have been tempted to call for reinforcements on the two occasions where all three players were in greenside traps on the same hole. At the first, he was to be seen hurrying from one bunker to the next in a bid to clear up the mess while the next group waited to play from the tee.
