GOLF.com: Tom Watson Returns to Birkdale — What the Five-Time Open Champion Shared

A Links Legend Returns to His Favorite Stage

Tom Watson, winner of five Open Championships between 1975 and 1983, made his return to Royal Birkdale for the 2026 Open. Now 76 and a Rolex ambassador, Watson sat down with GOLF.com's Michael Bamberger in the Birkdale clubhouse to reflect on a career defined by links mastery.

The Caddie Story You've Never Heard

One of the interview's most compelling moments centered on caddie Alfie Fyles, who looped for Watson across all five of his Open victories. Fyles had been on Gary Player's bag when Player won at Royal Lytham in 1974, but Player brought an American caddie for Carnoustie in 1975. IMG, Player's management agency, introduced Fyles to Watson — and they won immediately. In a twist, Watson then did the same thing the following year at Birkdale, dropping Fyles in favor of his own American caddie Bruce Edwards — despite Birkdale being Fyles's home course.

The episode reflects how fundamentally caddie relationships have evolved. What was once a week-by-week transaction is now a long-term partnership central to a player's competitive identity.

On Royal Birkdale: "Not Any Different"

Watson's read on the course was characteristically blunt: "This course is no different now than it was in 1976," he said, noting only length and a few redesigned holes as distinctions. Today's players, he added, face the same hard-running, wind-exposed challenge that defined his era.

Strokeslab Perspective

Watson's links success — built on trajectory control, bump-and-run execution, and creative course management — represents exactly the kind of SG: APP and SG: ATG dominance that separates Open contenders from the field. His advice to "learn the bump-and-run" remains as analytically sound today as it was in 1983.