The US Open at Oakmont is firmly in the sights of the top players now and Justin Rose has been recalling just why he expects such a tough test in a few weeks’ time.
Rose is one of the more experienced players on the PGA Tour right now and is one of the few to have actually played in a US Open at the venue.
For the Englishman, a return to form and winning a second major of his career would do just nicely after coming up just short at The Masters behind Rory McIlroy.
However, Rose has been speaking about his experiences at Oakmont and admitted that there’s parts of the course that just don’t suit him, albeit, others could struggle too.
Justin Rose sends warning about the US Open at Oakmont
Everyone is expecting a tough test at Oakmont.
Scottie Scheffler has admitted he’s looking forward to it, while Xander Schauffele has said it could be the toughest course they play all year.
And backing up those comments while speaking to the media at The Memorial, Justin Rose has admitted he remembers things being tough.
“Yeah, I just remember sort of expecting, you know, with the name Oakmont oak trees, and I was expecting more of a tree-lined golf course, and I was just like staggered by a sea of green grass. I was like, Whoa,” Rose admitted.
“It’s tough, for sure. From my point of view, I think I’ve got to approach it with the — I put a mini driver in the bag this week with the premise of I think I need to hit it in play at the U.S. Open. I think there’s still the guys who hit it far enough can still be very aggressive off the tee. That doesn’t really suit me, I don’t hit it quite far enough to justify being in the rough.
“So, yeah, I think from the way I’m going to try and play the golf course it’s definitely, you got to be somewhat long off the tee, 280 to 320, you got to hit it in that zip code, but you got to put it in play. So that’s my recollections of it. You can’t play that golf course from the rough as you can’t play this week from the rough.”
Justin Rose’s record at Oakmont Country Club
The record books only show Justin Rose as being at Oakmont twice and he’s had mixed fortunes really.
At the 2015/16 US Open, he didn’t even make the cut, shooting rounds of 72 and 76 to miss the line and fail to make it into the weekend.
Prior to that, his only other effort around Oakmont came back in 2007 but this time, things went much better for the Englishman.
Rose finished in T10 that year as Angel Cabrera won the event at a whopping five over par.
With a US Open title already under his belt and experience of Oakmont to call on as well, ‘Rosey’ will be more than confident of at least making a push.
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