Anirban Lahiri ready to renew love affair with Open

Star golfer Anirban Lahiri is hopeful that his love for links golf will lead to a strong showing at the Open that begins at Royal Troon in Scotland on Thursday.

The reigning Asian Tour number one, making his fourth appearance in the world’s oldest championship, is eager to improve on a career-best tied fifth outing in a major tournament achieved at the PGA Championship last season.

“The Open has always been good to me, so I am hoping for a good run,” said Lahiri, who made a hole-in-one on his debut at the Royal Lytham in 2012 and was tied 30th at St Andrews last year.

“I am feeling positive about my game and the golf course sets up for me. I like the way the holes shape away and it’s something that suits my eye.”

After a spectacular 2015 season where he won twice in Asia, made his Presidents Cup debut, earned his PGA Tour card and broke into the world’s top-50, Lahiri’s 2016 campaign has been rather muted with only two top-10s thus far, one in Asia and the other in the United States.

He conceded that competing in his rookie PGA Tour season has been challenging as he faces a new golf course almost every week. Hence, a return to a links setup in Scotland has provided him with a fresh confidence booster.

“I prefer playing links courses to parkland courses probably because we don’t play enough of it and also because you have to be more creative as it’s less sterile. You have to control your ball flight, up and down and sideways and you have to have a lot more feel,” said Lahiri.

“Out here, it tests every department of your game and that’s what makes links golf very special.

“The best think about links golf is that it’s not about the power game.”

In preparation for his week, the world number 62 has thrown in a two iron in his golf bag place of his five wood and left out a gap wedge in preference of a blade four iron.

“On a course like this, you need a lot of long irons off the tee,” he said.

This week’s Open championship will mark the start of an exciting run of big tournaments for Lahiri which includes the PGA Championship in a fortnight and the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro where he has qualified with S.S.P. Chawrasia.