Charley Hull of Britain watches her tee shot on the 3rd hole during the first round.Paul Childs/Reuters
There weren’t many big stories going into the women’s golf portion of the Olympics, which began on Wednesday. That’s because it is so difficult for golf to get into an Olympic state of mind.
It is separated by a lot of space, imaginative and geographical. To get to the course, you have to drive an hour outside Paris. The only cues there separating it from any other decent-sized tournament are the pink Olympic hoardings.
You’re also asking the competitors to rewire their philosophy.
“Regular week, you finish 10th and you feel good about yourself,” Canada’s best hope here, Brooke Henderson, said after her first round. “This week, you finish fourth and you feel terrible.”
Hunting around for ways to make golf an Olympic thing, headline writers turned to Charley Hull. Hull is a good golfer and an unrepentant smoker. This has made her an object of international fascination. Reporters here prompted her to complain about the total smoking ban in Olympic venues. She won’t be able to get a sneaky in on the course.
In a different interview, urged to say how much the Olympics mean to her, this two-time Olympian for Britain said, “I was never really a big Olympic watcher.”
Oh well.
Hull shot nine over on Wednesday – a moral victory for abstinence, I guess.
Several sports here stand slightly askance from the idea of the Olympics, but none does it so effortlessly as golf. That’s because golf’s not trying.
This is another tournament for these players, and nowhere close to the biggest one. Plenty of them are middle-aged parents. They’re not going to be running around the athletes village doing TikToks and having the time of their lives.
They’re working with the same colleagues they see every week all over the world. Even when they put on their Olympic uniforms – which aren’t much different from their regular uniform – all their hierarchies remain intact.
Scottie Scheffler won gold in the men’s competition, which is what Scottie Scheffler does everywhere else. Asked where it stood on his list of accomplishments, Scheffler said, “It’s pretty high up there.”
That’s athlete speak for ‘not very high up there.’
Scheffler came from behind to win, and Henderson’s going to have to do the same thing. She had one of those days that must feel like a wind catching hold of your parachute. Just when you think you’re about to touch land, you get yanked up in the air again.
She came out atrociously, bogeying four of the first five holes. Olympics over.
She birdied eight and nine. Olympics back on.
From then on, bogey, birdie, birdie, double bogey, bogey.
The way the course is built at Le Golf National, you can watch from a low rise as the players circle a natural basin for the last few holes. They finally come at you on 18 like an advancing army.
Everybody here is taking a lay-up onto the green, which is an island. Henderson went for it. Then she sank a 48-foot putt for an eagle. At the end of the round, she sits at two over. The leader, France’s Céline Boutier, is at seven under. Olympics on, but flickering.
Canada’s other representative in the tournament, Alena Sharp, had a marvellous day. She finished one under, tied for seventh.
“I feel really good going into tomorrow,” Sharp said. “I am very proud, actually.”
Henderson was asked the Scheffler question. Usually, she is not expansive, but she was on this one.
“Interesting,” she said, making that noise people make when something actually is interesting to them. “I would say some girls out here think it’s equal [to a major], or even above. I think it’s right up there.”
For the record, that’s two-time major winner Brooke Henderson giving the two-time major winner Scottie Scheffler answer.
One thing that can’t be argued – golf is popular. Though it’s a trek to get out to the course, and a nightmare drive back into the city, it was teeming on Wednesday. The competitors seemed more than surprised. They sounded relieved.
“I wasn’t sure what to expect stepping on that first green,” said the biggest draw here, Nelly Korda of the United States. “Then I just looked out and saw people four deep.”
Korda is a visual representation of golf’s apartness. You don’t see many Olympians getting out of the pool or leaving the mat wearing a $300,000 watch, the way Korda does when she’s coming off the course.
On that basis alone, this is shaping up as the first good golf experience at a Games.
It had a rough start at Rio 2016. No one wanted to go to Brazil. Half the men used Zika as an excuse. The course was a mess. Only the people who won medals had a good time.
In Tokyo, golf was verboten for COVID reasons. Those who golfed, golfed alone.
Here, finally, it feels as though it’s working out. This is a course of estimation. People are into it. As Korda came off after her round, they chanted her name. Even Hull, who was disastrous, stopped to sign autographs for kids. At Los Angeles 2028, they’ll play at Riviera. That should be the same vibe as an eight-day music festival.
Not everyone who plays here and then there will care all that much, and not everyone needs to. It’s true that they might be doing it more for sponsors than for their country. But all they need to do is put on a show.
Henderson is one of those who cares. That’s why she’s going for it on 18. In a professional context, taking that sort of risk is good way to turn a paying gig into a money loser.
“It’s a bigger stage,” she said. “There’s more meaning behind it.”
For some. And that’s enough. Not everything at the Olympics needs to be the most important thing that ever happened.