Qualla: 2025 Open Championship

2025 Open Championship: Introduction

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Titleist, CC BY 3.0. Pádraig Harrington hit the opening tee shot at 6:35 a.m. on a Thursday morning in July, holed an 18-foot putt for the first birdie of the championship, then went out and shot 75. He is forty-something Open Championships into a career that has produced two of his own Claret Jugs, and there was something fitting about the elder statesman of Irish golf striking the first ball of an Open at Portrush. By Sunday evening, the world's number one had everything else under control. Scottie Scheffler shot four rounds under 70, finished at seventeen-under for the tournament, and won the 153rd Open Championship by four strokes over Harris English. There was no doubt for most of the back nine. There was also, again, a roar at Portrush.

Read more: 2025 Open Championship on Qualla

Image: Titleist | CC BY 3.0

2025 Open Championship: Portrush, Again

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nilfanion, CC BY-SA 3.0. This was the third time Royal Portrush had hosted the Open. The first was 1951, when Max Faulkner won and the championship was for the first time held outside Great Britain. The second was 2019, when Shane Lowry won by six in a wind that almost blew the gallery off the dunes. Six...

Read more: 2025 Open Championship on Qualla

Image: Nilfanion | CC BY-SA 3.0

2025 Open Championship: Five Leaders on Thursday

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Alexrk2, CC BY-SA 3.0. The first-day draw had a clear morning side and a friendlier afternoon side - a difference of about 1.3 strokes in scoring average. By the end of Thursday, five players were tied for the lead, the most since six shared the first-round lead in 1938. Scheffler shot a three-under 68...

Read more: 2025 Open Championship on Qualla

Image: Alexrk2 | CC BY-SA 3.0

2025 Open Championship: Scheffler Takes Control

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nzeemin, CC BY-SA 3.0. Friday changed the shape of the week. Scheffler shot 64 - the low round of the championship to that point - and led Matt Fitzpatrick by one. It was the first time a world number one had held the 36-hole lead at the Open since Tiger Woods in 2006. The cut came in at one over par, ...

Read more: 2025 Open Championship on Qualla

Image: Nzeemin | CC BY-SA 3.0

2025 Open Championship: Saturday's Four-Shot Lead

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Titleist, CC BY 3.0. He could not. Scheffler shot a bogey-free 67 on Saturday and led by four. It was his fourth 54-hole lead in a major; he had won the previous three. Li Haotong, ranked 111th in the world entering the week, shot 69 to sit solo second, the kind of leaderboard improbability the Open ...

Read more: 2025 Open Championship on Qualla

Image: Titleist | CC BY 3.0

2025 Open Championship: Sunday's Five-Iron Approach

Sun, 24 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Titleist, CC BY 3.0. Scheffler started the final round four ahead of Li. He hit his approach on the first to within two feet, made birdie, made two more on the front nine, and at one point led by seven. The eighth caught him - a tee shot in a bunker, a second shot that hit the lip and stayed in the s...

Read more: 2025 Open Championship on Qualla

Image: Titleist | CC BY 3.0