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AUGUSTA, GEORGIA | A funny thing happened on the weekend of the most unusual Masters – a 63-year-old man competed head-to-head on consecutive days with the two longest hitters in the world. He even beat one of them.
“I felt right in the middle of it, in the thick of it,” said Bernhard Langer, who won his first Masters before Rory McIlroy and Bryson DeChambeau were born, yet found himself on the stage with each of them this weekend at Augusta National. “I got to experience the longest guys in the world right now, and it’s quite amazing. Different game.”
Buoyed by an opening 68 and boosted slightly by the tournament’s seven-month postponement from April to November, Langer became the oldest player to make the cut at Augusta National – 35 days older than Tommy Aaron was when he played the weekend in 2000 on a course that was 490 yards shorter than it is today. The golf course now is 570 yards longer than it was in 1985 when Langer won the first of his two green jackets.
Of course Langer making cuts at Augusta is something we almost take for granted, even as he regularly plies his regular trade on the PGA Tour Champions instead of with the young stars. This was his third consecutive made cut at the Masters and sixth in the past eight years. He even tied for eighth in 2014 at age 56.
Langer, however, doesn’t take weekends at Augusta for granted as he gets older and the players around him get longer.
“I hope to make the cut, but it’s getting longer and longer, let’s put it that way, especially this year,” he said. “I don’t think the course has ever played this long. It was really wet, and I don't remember hitting 3 woods and hybrids into so many par-4s.”
Seeing Langer do what he did against two of golf’s biggest power hitters last weekend was, frankly, remarkable. He ranked dead last (by 8 yards) of the 60 players who made the cut in driving distance, averaging 260 yards off the tee. He also ranked first in driving accuracy (87.5 percent), hitting 13, 12, 14 and 10 of the 14 fairways each day.
The German’s game was in stark contrast to the players he got paired with on the weekend. On Saturday he played with McIlroy, who hit the ball a combined 1,024 yards longer than Langer on their 14 driving holes together – an average of 73.14 yards farther off each tee.
On Sunday, he got sent out with DeChambeau – who is taking brute force in golf to previously unimagined levels. DeChambeau averaged a field-best 324.4 yards on the measured holes – 65 yards longer than Langer – but was often more than 100 yards ahead of him Sunday. Langer walked away with wide eyes while beating DeChambeau by three shots Sunday.
“Normally I play my own game; I don’t even worry about who I’m with and all that, but I was a little bit spectating here and there,” he said. “I was in awe and just watching how they swing and how hard they hit it. And every once in a while I had to tell myself, ‘Go on; stop watching and play your game and focus on what you want to do.’ But it is fun to watch and fascinating how they do it.”
“I try to think about what scores I would shoot if I was hitting it where he hit it. Honestly, it’s like me playing an 8,500-yard golf course. That’s what it’s like. It’s so impressive."
Rory McIlroy
They should be equally fascinated by him. Langer finished tied for 29th place at 3-under-par 285 – ahead of 27 finishers including DeChambeau, Adam Scott, Tiger Woods, Tony Finau, Collin Morikawa, Jordan Spieth, Phil Mickelson and Bubba Watson.
“I try to think about what scores I would shoot if I was hitting it where he hit it,” said McIlroy. “Honestly, it’s like me playing an 8,500-yard golf course. That’s what it’s like. It’s so impressive, just the way he methodically plots his way around and gets it up and down when he needs to. It’s really cool to watch. And yeah, I wish in 30 years’ time I'm back here doing the exact same thing he is … hopefully hit it a little longer.”
Early Sunday, DeChambeau drove the 350-yard third green while Langer laid up 120 yards short. Langer made birdie while DeChambeau three-putted for par.
DeChambeau could learn a thing or two about course management from Langer.
“Yeah, he’s an unbelievable iron player,” DeChambeau said. “He grinds over everything. Doesn’t give up. His long-iron play is stellar still, and I think that’s what makes him so amazing, and definitely I still look up to him. Even though I’m bombing it by him, he’s still playing better than me. It doesn’t matter. That’s the cool part about the game of golf. You can shoot a score whatever way you want, and he’s able to do it still at his age that way, which is pretty impressive.”
"He’s an unbelievable iron player. He grinds over everything. Doesn’t give up. His long-iron play is stellar still, and I think that’s what makes him so amazing."
Bryson DeChambeau
So how does Langer – who continues to dominate and win on the senior circuit that gets filled with longer fifty-somethings each year – do it?
“I have to miss the greens in the right place,” he said. “Like, say, for instance, 18, I hit a really good drive, and I had 226 yards to the pin. So I’m hitting 2 hybrid, and I know, if I hit it right, I’m probably dead if I hit it in the bunker. So I have to guard against that and hopefully hit the green. But if I miss, I need to miss left. I missed left, and it wasn’t a particularly good shot, but I had a chance to get up and down. I played a beautiful chip to about a foot and made par.
“That’s how I have to play several of the holes, especially the long ones, but it doesn't always work out that easy. It's much easier to hit fairways and greens and have a birdie putt, but that’s hard to do when you come in with those kind of clubs. I mean, 17, I hit a beautiful drive, and I hit 2 hybrid. Rory hit driver and pitching wedge, I think. That's what I’m competing against.”
When Langer returns in April for his 38th Masters, he’ll still be 63. But he hopes the course will play a little firmer and shorter as he keeps trying to extend his age record with another made cut.
“I think I might have another, maybe a few more, in there,” he said with a smile. “You never know. I know how to play this golf course and just have to play my angles and rely on my short game. With me it’s really all the putter. If I can make a few putts, I know I can shoot somewhere around par or even under, and that’s usually good enough to hang in there.”
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