[Photo: Adrian Dennis]
Coming off three missed cuts at the majors this year and with Sir Nick Faldo criticising his approach to links golf, Bryson DeChambeau shot into contention after an opening-round 67 at the Open Championship.
The two-time US Open champion did not make the weekend at the Masters despite winning three times on LIV leading into Augusta National, and he exited early from the PGA and US Open.
DeChambeau arrived at Royal Birkdale with just two career top-10s at the Open in eight starts, providing the room for three-time Open champion Faldo to lash out at DeChambeau for his handling of links golf on the eve of the 2026’s final men’s major.
“I’d say it to his face: DeChambeau has zero clue of strategy,” Faldo said on the Sky Sports Golf podcast. “He said last year, ‘I’m going to go out and attack the links.’ Well, I’ve never attacked a links. You thread it, don’t you? You feed it down the fairway. You look at humps and bumps. If I send it over and feed it, it nudges back into play.”
DeChambeau opened his Thursday round, paired with Scottie Scheffler and fellow LIV golfer Tyrrell Hatton, with a pair of birdies, before a third came at the short par-4 10th. Despite a surprising dropped shot at the par-5 14th, DeChambeau made consecutive birdies at the 16th and 17th to share the lead at four under. Another bogey at the 18th, after going long with his approach and failing to made a seven-foot par saver, still left DeChambeau a three-under 67 and just one shot behind the clubhouse lead held by England’s Dan Brown and South Korea’s Sungjae Im (66).
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After his round, DeChambeau declined to talk to the TV broadcasters or the media, but spoke to R&A radio.
“Yeah, definitely satisfying,” DeChambeau said. “Any time you get off to a great start, it’s awesome, but there’s three more days, dude. There’s still a lot of golf to be played. But ultimately from my perspective I was really excited about the way I played.
“There’s some driving holes out there I’ve got to work on. Other than that, I played really well. Made some good putts and three-putted once, but that’s life.”
Asked about his game plan for the firm, fast par-70 at Royal Birkdale, DeChambeau referenced strategy three times, perhaps no coincidence given Faldo’s early week comments.
“I think you’ve got to be a lot more strategic out on the golf course,” DeChambeau said. “I feel like I did a really good job today of being incredibly strategic and focused super hard on placing it in the right places. Besides 18, I placed the ball in some good areas. I just need to hit more fairways. Other than that, I feel like my strategy was nice today.”
Playing partners Scottie Scheffler (68) and Tyrrell Hatton (69) were also under par on Day 1. Hatton was asked whether it was surprising to see DeChambeau contending after round one at the Open.
“No, it shouldn’t surprise anyone; he’s an amazing player,” Hatton said.
“No, he flights the ball great. His ball flight today was really good. He didn’t really hit many bad shots. As I said, he’s an amazing player, and it shouldn’t really surprise anyone that he’s doing well.”
DeChambeau was also debuting new, 3D-printed irons at Royal Birkdale.
“A single iron takes about an hour to 3D print, DeChambeau said on the eve of the tournament during an interview on The Open’s Live at the Range stream. “A full set’s about nine hours, so it’s not that bad. Machining and cooling and all the different processes that we do, it’s just a couple days’ work, and I can have a club from CAD (computer-aided design) capability to a fully-printed set within four or five days.”
