A lot of the criticism that Carnoustie took in 1999 was entirely justified. The plus-6 winning score, the plus-12 cut, 102 rounds in the 80s, two in the 90s, the 78.31 scoring average for the 444 rounds played, a talented but inexperienced Sergio Garcia shooting plus-30 for the first two rounds, and Jean Van De Velde’s implausible implosion at the 72nd hole where the Frenchman hacked his way to a disastrous triple bogey seven, made that year’s Open Championship tough to watch as well as play. After the dust settled, John Philp, Carnoustie’s greenkeeper, and the R&A admitted they had made mistakes. The fairways were simply too narrow in places — the landing area for the second shot on the par-5 sixth was little more than 10 yards wide — and the penalty for missing them was too severe as the rough had “benefited” from a mild, wet spring and gotten out of control. Two to 3 feet high in places and impossibly dense at the bottom, the hay frustrated many a player who said he’d rather have stayed at home than embarrass himself on what was unquestionably the hardest Open Championship course ever devised.

A lot of the criticism was unqualified, too. For a start, Philp couldn’t control the spring conditions that had caused the rough to propagate so quickly, nor did he have a say in the weather for the championship itself that saw an already tough course go from difficult to over-the-top. Light rain and strong winds meant even good drives were pushed into hellish lies.

Plus — and far too many players forgot this — it was the Open Championship, the game’s oldest and most prestigious tournament, where endurance, patience, stamina, and perseverance are every bit as important as skill. Unfortunately, many in the field came across as whiny toddlers having a tantrum because they didn’t like the way they had to earn their place in history, or the $550,000 winner’s check that was on offer that week. Sure it was tough, but the claret jug doesn’t go to the man who complains the best. “The set-up is a joke,” said Scotland’s Sandy Lyle, who shot 85 and 81 in the first two rounds. “If you can’t enjoy an event like this you have to ask what’s going on,” said David Duval, who finished four rounds at 22-over-par. “I wish I hadn’t come,” Phil Mickelson who missed the cut by one, said.

Not making a contribution to the complaints and suggestions box was Paul Lawrie, a typically dour Scot from Aberdeen who to that point in his career had won just twice in seven years on the European Tour. Starting the final round 10 strokes behind leader Van De Velde, Lawrie shot a 4-under-par 67, a round which, considering the conditions, ranks among the top 10 greatest closing rounds to win a major and which was all but forgotten in the hubbub surrounding the course and Van De Velde’s last-hole antics. “I avoided any comments about the set-up,” Law rie told the London Times recently. “You heard stuff like ‘this is silly’ or ‘the rough is too thick,’ or ‘you could lose your golf shoes out here,’ but I steered clear of all that. I had a game plan, and I was patient.”

Early indications are that the course dubbed Carnasty eight years ago is considerably more playable this time round, with some players even saying it’s actually gone too far the other way and will be too easy. “I think the fairways are very wide, and there’s no rough,” South Africa’s David Frost said yesterday. “It’s too lenient. I just think it should have been tighter.”

K.J. Choi, who played with Lawrie in 1999 was also surprised to see how different the course looks now. “You can hit the ball anywhere and find it,” the Korean said. “You can still see the ball.”

The wind, however, will make the course extremely challenging said Choi, who hit a wedge to the green on the 499-yard 18th hole in practice on Saturday and a 5-wood on Sunday when the wind had shifted 180 degrees.

Really, a decent breeze is all that Carnoustie needs to challenge the best, and failing to recognize that was perhaps the R&A’s biggest mistake in 1999. Jack Nicklaus, who finished joint-runnerup there in 1968 and tied for third seven years later regards Carnoustie as the hardest course on the Open Championship rotation. He said it’s plenty tough enough without any help from a malevolent greenkeeper. Likewise Ernie Els, who tied for 24th in 1999 at 14 over par, says it’s the toughest of the lot. “It’s got length and it’s got great bunkering,” he said. “You’ve really got to have your wits with you to play this golf course, and it seems like the wind always blows here.”

Equally impressed are Tiger Woods, who thought the conditions in 1999 took away from the course’s status as one of the best in the world, and Mickelson who made three visits last week and came away very pleasantly surprised. “I didn’t realize what a wonderful course it is,” he said. “It’s terrific.”

Woods, with two runners-up finishes in the majors so far this year, will be desperate to win and reestablish his dominance over a chasing pack that has seen one or two glimpses of vulnerability from him recently and which seems better equipped to take advantage of those vulnerabilities than it did in 2000, when the world no. 1’s brilliance was met with little resistance.

Mickelson, who has shown typically extravagant unpredictability in recent weeks, certainly can win, but he’ll have to forget his terrible record in this championship (one top-10 finish in 14 starts) and the disappointment of losing the Scottish Open last weekend in a playoff with France’s Gregory Havret.

Given that he’s largely unknown; French; has finished first and tied third in his last two events, and would be no more surprising a winner than Lawrie, Ben Curtis, or Todd Hamilton (okay maybe not Hamilton who had won the Honda Classic five months before winning the Open in 2004), Havret might actually be a good bet at Carnoustie. But with a list of champions that before Lawrie was made up of Tommy Armour (1931), Henry Cotton (1937), Ben Hogan (1953), Gary Player (1968), and Tom Watson (1975), Carnoustie obviously favors true class. How could you not go with Woods?

tonydear71@comcast.net