SF Examiner: Historic Olympic Club will pose a daunting challenge for US Open contenders

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

The trophy was there, bright and gleaming. The trophy sitting on the tee of the ridiculously lengthened eighth hole at Olympic Club. The trophy and U.S. Open, thoughts about what is coming and what has gone.

A photo day to capture the beauty of Olympic — where the second full week in June, for a fifth time, America’s golfing championship will be played in all its ecstasy and agony.

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Copyright 2012 SF Newspaper Company

SF Examiner: New star McIlroy emerges in time for 2012 Open in SF

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

This Open is closed, shut tight, impenetrably by the new genius of a golfer, Rory McIlroy. Record numbers, remarkable play. And now the focus shifts to the West, to San Francisco, to the Olympic Club, where America’s golfing championship will be on display next year.


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Copyright 2011 SF Newspaper Company

SF Examiner: It's all about survival at the US Open

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

In the mind’s eye, there’s Payne Stewart standing in disbelief on the severely sloped 18th green at San Francisco’s Olympic Club, his 8-foot birdie putt attempt rolling 25 feet below the hole. Ah yes, the U.S. Open, agony and very little ecstasy.

That was then — and might be again next year when the Open returns to Olympic — but this is now, the 2011 Open at Congressional Country Club in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. The bewilderment and suffering are much the same.

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Copyright 2011 SF Newspaper Company

SF Examiner: Johnny Miller puts his fingerprint on Silverado Country Club

By Art Spander
Special to The Examiner

Johnny Miller was back in his city a few days ago, back in San Francisco, where he grew up and learned the type of golf that would carry him to two major championships and a place with NBC as the game’s most candid television commentator.

Miller played Olympic Club while he was here, as he did while a junior member nearly a half-century ago, and as he did in the 1966 U.S. Open at age 19. He gained another perspective of what the old O.C. will be like when the U.S. Open returns in 2012.

Read the full story here.

Copyright 2011 SF Newspaper Company