Power adusting to dreamland as Harrington focussed on keeping head in the game
Padraig Harrington. Photo by Montana Pritchard/PGA of America
George Bernard Shaw once wrote that "Youth is the most precious thing in life; it is too bad it has to be wasted on young folks."
He wasn't talking about the Masters or the chances of Pádraig Harrington pulling on that green jacket on Sunday night, but he would appreciate the benefit of experience, and it's his head, rather than any technical aspect of the game at the Dubliner (50) must get right this week if he's to have a chance of being competitive.
Yesterday, the three-time Major champion returned to Augusta National as a player for the first time since 2015, fresh off a PGA TOUR Champions career-best tie for second in the Rapiscan Systems Classic in Biloxi, Mississippi, on Sunday.
It wasn't precisely the Master, but it will have helped Harrington get his head in the right place.
He certainly walked away from the front nine a happier man after partnering Rory McIlroy to victory over debutant Séamus Power and Shane Lowry in their nine-hole match.
“You’re better off with a good head on your shoulders and not quite knowing the golf course than knowing the golf course and having no head on your shoulders and being headless.”
Harrington went off to play the back nine and check out the changes to the 11th and 13th.
But he will have imparted his best advice to Power on how to handle the week, and as he said before jetting out to Augusta two weeks ago, it's all in the head.
"I'm sure I'll have a practice round with him too, and I'll tell him that he just can't prepare for everything and don't even try to. You'll just wear yourself out," said the man who was once that soldier — a bundle of energy from Monday to Wednesday but spent by Sunday afternoon. "
"You're better off with a good head on your shoulders and not quite knowing the golf course than knowing the golf course and having no head on your shoulders and being headless."
Harrington felt he had his best chances to win green jackets in 2007 when Zach Johnson wedged the course to death and in 2008 when Trevor Immelman held off Tiger Woods.
He was seventh and fifth in those years, respectively, but he knows what he has to do.
"The golf course changes substantially once you get playing, and you have to have your head in the game for the whole week," he said of a course that changes radically from Monday to Thursday and then changes again at the weekend.
"If your head is in the right place, you can make the right decisions about what you're presented with on the day and not thinking you can cover everything on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.
Is it all down to iron play? Putting? Driving?
The answer is all three and none of them.
"You don't want to be out of position too often. It doesn't matter how good your short game is because you are not going to be getting up and down all the time, and to be in position with your irons, you've got to drive a great drive it well.
"If you've driven it well, you're coming in off the fairways, you've got control, you're coming in with slightly shorter irons, so I would think driving it well as a huge factor. Clearly have to put well, but if you are missing fairways or you're out of position, and it's a struggle all week, there's a lot of stress."
Harrington is driving the ball well, but the old Nicklaus adage that you just have to hit it in the middle of the greens no longer holds true on lightning surfaces with diabolical slopes.
"It's not a golf course you can play hitting the ball to 30 feet suddenly becomes 50 feet over a tier. Generally, l you're hitting it into small areas all the time, so your only option is to hit it close a lot of times that's why there are a lot of birdies. "You don't get an option on a hole like 14 to hit it in the middle of the green. Only on 10 and 11 can you do that.
"When you're standing in the fairway, your head has to be in the game and I don't play for the middle of the greens anyway. It always comes naturally to me to aim for the pins."
Once the Masters does not turn into a putting competition, Harrington feels he has a chance.
As for Power, he has now played 36 holes, having followed 18 on Sunday by playing the back nine with Billy Horschel and the front with his fellow Irishmen.
"So, I came out yesterday, and I played, and it was incredible," he said. I" t's one of those places where I was lucky enough to be here five or six times before but never played it. It's just so far beyond expectations. The course is in fantastic condition. I can't wait to play."
He got an Augusta roar at the 16th, rifling a short iron over a front pin to around five feet, then skimmed a six-iron over the lake that made dry land with an inch to spare.
"It was cool," he said. "It really is a thrill. You see so many memorable shots down in that corner, and I know it's only a practice round, but it was nice to hear the cheer and then skimming the six iron; I was scared I was going to skim it straight into the water. It wasn't too bad!"
He's here to compete, but he knows he's up against the odds.
"I think the secret is going to be around the greens," he said. "That's what I've seen so far. I played just nine holes with Billy Horschel and Talor Gooch, who have been here around plenty of times, and just getting little bits of advice from them.
"It's just when you're out of position, where to hit it, where you have a chance of getting up and down. That's what I'm trying to learn, obviously having not played here before.
"Yeah, it's going to be a challenge. There are going to be pin positions I've never seen before, and I'm sure the conditions will change a lot as the week goes on. So, it's going to be adjusting on the fly and talking it out with Simon and seeing the best we can do."
Even having been to the course six times as a fan, he was taken aback by the greens,
"You can see the course on TV for the most part, but television doesn't do justice to the slopes and the complexity of some of the greens," he said.
"That's kind of the thing I'm trying to learn, hitting some putts, like oh, that's not too bad. You think it's two feet, and you look back up, and it could be eight, nine feet. It just breaks more than you might think.
"So, it's those little kinds of things I'm trying to learn, I guess, as I go. Hopefully, we can find as many as we can over yesterday, today, tomorrow, and hopefully Wednesday."
