US Open to go back to its roots at Shinnecock Hills

THE US Open will return to New York's Shinnecock Hills Golf Club in June 2018, the US Golf Association announced yesterday.

It will be the fifth time the seaside course on Long Island has hosted the championship and the first since the 2004 tournament was marred by brutally hot weather and some ill-tended greens that turned rock-hard and became almost impossible to hold.

"We are thrilled that our national championship will return to one of our country's most-storied venues," USGA President Jim Hyler said at Congressional, venue of this week's 111th US Open.

"We are confident that Shinnecock Hills will provide a true challenge for the world's premier players, as it has for more than a century."

Shinnecock Hills, one of five founding clubs of the USGA in 1894, was the first 18-hole golf course on the US East Coast and the only venue to host the championship in three centuries.

In 1896, Shinnecock hosted the second US Open, won by James Foulis, and 90 years later Raymond Floyd won by two strokes over Chip Beck and Lanny Wadkins.

In 1995, Corey Pavin clinched a two-stroke victory over Australian Greg Norman with a memorable four-wood approach to the final green and in 2004, South African Retief Goosen beat Phil Mickelson by two strokes for his second US Open title.