Duel in the Sun

by Michael Corcoran

In the rest of the world, they call it the Open Championship. Americans call it the British Open, but if any tournament is considered the battle for the world championship of golf, it is the one held annually on the great links courses of Scotland and England, the birthplace of the game.

By the time the 1977 Open came to Turnberry on Scotland's west coast, Jack Nicklaus had established himself as the greatest champion the golf world has ever known, well on his way to the record that Tiger Woods would spend his childhood dreaming of and pointing toward. The sight of Nicklaus on the leaderboard was enough to make strong golfers shake. Everyone knew that Nicklaus was the man to beat in every major championship he entered.

At the same time, Tom Watson had become the latest golfer to be heralded as the "Next Nicklaus." Watson had overcome his reputation for choking in big tournaments and was beginning to be viewed by his peers as the top player of his generation. He had won two majors, but there were still questions about his ability to stand up under the fiercest pressure.

There are few moments in sports when it is clear to one and all that a torch has been passed. The 1977 Open Championship at Turnberry was one such event. The weather was uncharacteristically warm, British golf fans bared their pink skin to the unfamiliar sun, and the course played hard and fast. Nicklaus and Watson were tied after the first two rounds. Nicklaus shot a blistering 65-66 over the last two days to post a 72-hole score that set a tournament record; but Watson, paired with Nicklaus over those fateful 36 holes, looked Jack in the eye and shot 65-65 to win by a stroke. And the Next Nicklaus had been found at last, even as the original kept winning major tournaments -- but the air of invincibility was gone forever.

Michael Corcoran takes the drama of this rare moment in golf history and brings it to vivid life. He draws on his interviews with competitors, caddies, commentators, and spectators to tell the magnificent story of this epic duel in all the rich detail any fan of golfing drama could ask for. Duel in the Sun is an unforgettable tale of the rise of a new hero and the grace of an older champion welcoming him to the summit of the game.

Genres: Sports

236 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2002

About the author

There is more than one author in the Goodreads catalog with this name. This entry is for Michael ^ Corcoran.

Michael Corcoran has written seven previous books, including Duel in the Sun, an account of the 1977 British Open, and For Which It Stands: An Anecdotal Biography of the American Flag. He's written for numerous magazines and been the editor of a few. He lives with his wife and their children in Springtown, Pennsylvania.

Reviews

[Matthew · Rating 2 out of 5]

I usually don't have too many books that I complete but rate below three stars - if I'm not enjoying it, I stop reading. Life is too short. But that's the thing - I DID enjoy this book, but it was under false pretenses. No matter the title, it's truly hard to consider this a book about Tom Watson vs Jack Nicklaus in the 1977 Open Championship. And that's because the author spends AT MOST 25% of the book talking about the 1977 Open itself, and only part of that was about Watson vs Nicklaus.

Certainly a shot-by-shot book of a final round wouldn't even be interesting to a golf nut like me, but when the majority of the book is about the history of the golf course, some bio about Nicklaus and Watson (all which I knew already) and then plenty of what I have to call "filler" info the author undoubtedly learned in his research, it's a disappointment. It's all interesting which is why I kept reading, but it is decidedly NOT about the Duel in the Sun.

[Geoffrey Gammell · Rating 1 out of 5]

Play through this one.

Meandering tangents of irrelevance with some poor writing about golf. The first 2/3s of this book add very little. It’s an essay disguised as a book.

[Dan Carpenter · Rating 4 out of 5]

I remember watching this as a kid and being riveted to the screen on Sat and Sunday (only two days it was telecast back then). Great golf, high drama, and pure sportsmanship was on display at Turnberry that weekend. Corcoran does a commendable job in recreating the tension between an aging dominant lion (Nicklaus) and a younger lion on the rise. He gets plenty of dialogue and strategy into the narrative to build suspense and pull back the curtain for the non-golfer and golfer alike. I am putting today's date on this but read it several years ago and still have the book.

[Scott · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good read about Nicklaus and Watson but barely even discussed their final round at the Open.