There was a time when Darren Clarke, the 2011 Open champion, would treat himself to new watches and flashy cars every few minutes, or so it seemed. Even his management group told him to hang back until he had done something to deserve the next crazy spending spree. This week at the Open, on the other hand, the now 52-year-old Clarke arrived at Sandwich with something which gave him a different sense of pride – a caddie whose grandfather had done as Clarke himself in winning the Claret Jug.
Sandy Armour, as said caddie is called, just happens to be the grandson of Tommy Armour, who won the 1931 Open at Carnoustie.
Tommy, for the record, was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1895 and went to school and university in the city. Then, after serving as a machine-gunner for the Black Watch regiment in the First World War, he emigrated to the States in 1925 to further his golf career – and duly won the ’27 U.S. Open and the ’30 PGA Championship ahead of the Open.
Sandy Armour, who was 9 years old when his grandfather passed away, played the game himself. However, where his brother, Tommy Armour III, carved out a living on the PGA Tour, this free spirit among men drifted into caddying. He had been working for Olin Browne for six years when Clarke asked Browne if he could inherit him. Browne agreed, and it was only three weeks into the Clarke-Armour arrangement that the pair won the first of their two titles on the PGA Tour Champions.
Straightaway, Armour, who had been reared on tales of his grandfather, had recognised traits in Clarke to put him in mind of the great man.
“My grandfather loved a drink and Darren’s no different,” he began.
Then, as he put down the Clarke bag of clubs after their opening 71, he delved a bit deeper.
“At the outbreak of World War I, my grandfather served as a machine-gunner, a post in which he excelled,” Armour said. “Everyone knows the story of how he was blinded in both eyes by a mustard gas explosion and how he regained the sight of his right eye well enough to be able to play golf. What people don’t mention very often is that the reason he so excelled as a machine-gunner – he earned an audience for himself with King George V – was because he had strong enough hands to cope better than most with pistol recoil.”
When it came to golf, Tommy Armour was so powerful with his irons as to become known as “the Iron Master.”
“It was all to do with those strong hands of his and, as I see it, Darren’s hands are much the same,” the Iron Master’s grandson said.
Clarke, who bases himself in the Bahamas as he plays on the PGA Tour Champions, says of his caddie that he wasted no time in adapting when they started out together some 14 tournaments ago.
“It was not an easy thing to do, given my tantrums,” chuckled the player. “At 52, there are times I can act as if I’m 12 or 13 but Sandy knows what’s what. He knows when to speak, when not to speak, and when to offer help.”
Armour felt that his man’s opening 71 at Royal St George’s was neither more nor less than he deserved.
“Obviously he’s got great memories of the course where he won but the Champions tour of today is good practice for the big stuff,” he said. “The courses aren’t short and, if the players stay fit, like a Bernhard Langer or, indeed a Darren, they can stay sharp on all fronts.
“The only problem when it comes to an Open is that the greens are different. The Champions tour greens are not as fast as these and the tendency for Darren so far this week has been to leave his putts a foot and a half short.”
There was something else he wanted to say about Clarke: “Why isn’t he in the Hall of Fame? If Freddie Couples is in it, Darren should be. After all, his achievements are on much the same level.”
There was a fascinating moment on Thursday evening when Martin Slumbers, the chief executive of the R&A, paused for a chat as Clarke, Armour and manager Chubby Chandler were relaxing in the official R&A hotel.
Chandler expressed good-natured surprise that the hotel did not offer Sky and that watching the golf was therefore out of the question; Clarke questioned one of the day’s pin positions; and then Armour had his say. Slumbers, though he was in the throes of must have been the most stressful week of the last 18 months, was soon all ears.
“Excuse me Mr Slumbers, but my grandfather won the Claret Jug in 1931 and no one in the family has anything in the way of a memento,” Armour said. “Is there any way I could buy one?”
“Drop me a line and I’ll see what I can do,” said Slumbers.
When I asked Armour how his grandfather would have felt about him caddying for an Open winner, he smiled a rueful smile.
“He’d have told me that if I’d only bothered to work on my putting, I’d have been out here playing myself,” he said.