Open will return to Muirfield in 2013

Published on Monday 4 May 2009 22:51

THE Open will go back to East Lothian in 2013 when the oldest major is held at Muirfield for the 16th occasion, the Royal and Ancient has announced. It means three of the next five championships will be held in Scotland.

R&A Director of Championships David Hill said: "We are delighted that the Open is returning to Muirfield, an outstanding championship course that consistently produces a very worthy champion.

"For any club to host the Open it requires a great deal of work and the R&A would, therefore, like to thank the Honourable Company of Edinburgh Golfers for its continued co-operation, which has enabled the championship to come back to this fine venue for a 16th time."

The Open is also at Turnberry in July, St Andrews next summer, Royal St George's in 2011 and Royal Lytham in 2012.

Always one of the most popular venues with players and spectators alike, Muirfield has regularly hosted the world's finest golfers since Harold Hilton, the English amateur, held off the challenge of Hugh Kirkaldy in 1892.

With an international reputation as one of the fairest and truest tests of links golf – "What you see is what you get," Jack Nicklaus once observed – Muirfield last staged the Open seven years ago, when Ernie Els won his third major in the only four-man, four-hole play-off in Open history. Els joined a distinguished group of past champions at the links belonging to the Honourable Company of Edinburgh golfers including Nick Faldo (1987 and 1992), Tom Watson (1980), Lee Trevino (1972), Jack Nicklaus (1966) and Gary Player (1959).

The course has been used extensively for other R&A championships, staging ten Amateurs – the most recent in 1998 when Sergio Garcia took the title – the British Seniors and two Walker Cups in 1959 and 1979.