A legacy of champions runs deep in the Fox family, and on Sunday, Ryan Fox added another illustrious page to that history. Nearly four decades after his father’s triumph in the Rugby World Cup, Ryan secured his own place in the annals of sports by clinching The Open Championship.
The feat was nothing short of remarkable for this New Zealander, whose veins run with the legacy of an All Blacks hero. On a day marked by intense competition, where the iconic Claret Jug seemed within reach of four different contenders, it was Ryan, son of Grant Fox, who emerged victorious, unyielding in the face of challenge.
Let’s dive right into the defining climax of this storied tournament. The 154th golf major, steeped in history, came down to the wire, with the ultimate decision resting on the final putt of the concluding group on the last day.
As the clock edged past 6:30 PM on that breezy Southport evening, Cameron Young had been biding his time, a waiting game that stretched over two long hours. For much of that interval, his impressive nine-under-par score seemed destined for a lasting lead.
The odds were daunting when Fox landed on the 18th fairway, sending an iron shot soaring 172 yards against a crosswind to find the green just 11 feet away from the pin. Despite the slender chance, given that a mere five out of 77 competitors managed a birdie on the final hole, a play-off appeared inevitable.
But the 78th man to try was Grant’s lad. And the thing about Grant is that he never missed – he was the fly-half with the metronomic boot and some traits don’t skip the generations. And so Fox pulled back that blade, brought it through, and after a small track from left to right the ball disappeared below ground.
Ryan Fox won The Open in dramatic fashion after he birdied the 18th hole on the final day
The New Zealander held his nerve under intense pressure to win his first ever major
Fox sank his putt on the 18th hole to trigger jubilant celebrations at Royal Birkdale in Southport
With two arms in the air, Fox was the Champion Golfer of Year.
‘Wow,’ he said in the immediate aftermath, having turned in a card for a 68 and a 10-under-par total. ‘I don’t really know what to think at the moment.
‘I’ve got a lot of people to thank. First of all, my family, my wife and kids are in Florida at the moment. I spoke to my kids last night, and they said, “Bring back a trophy”. I think this is a pretty cool one to bring back for them.’
We can stick with the family theme a while longer, because it isn’t just Grant in the lineage – Fox’s maternal grandfather, Merv Wallace, also captained the New Zealand cricket team in the Fifties. With Fox the father to two daughters, one can only wonder what comes next.
But a word on the chasers in the here and now – Young was one behind after a 64, overnight leader Sam Burns was a spot further back with head of regrets, and they collectively stood ahead of a pair of challengers in Scottie Scheffler and a local lad named Tommy Fleetwood on seven under.
Had Fleetwood not bogeyed three in a row in the middle of his round, maybe this would have been his day. Maybe they would have closed the streets here for a year in celebration. But no one could begrudge a win for Fox, a 39-year-old who has walked the hard yards in this maddening game.
Fox became New Zealand’s second champion at The Open after Sir Bob Charles in 1963
The no-nonsense 39-year-old was speechless when reflecting on his triumph
After 14 years on the grind, he had already proven himself more than a familiar name with two PGA Tour wins and three on the European circuit, but he had never been higher than 23rd in the world. Arriving in Southport, he was ranked 56th and as recently as March underwent surgery to remove kidney stones. Men of a certain age can relate.
But then came this, which is to say an uplifting end to a thrilling day. Burns and Young can fight over who had the worst time of it, because Burns, runner up at the US Open last month, started two clear in his pairing with Fox and never turned up. All of the finesse and touch he used in building his lead vanished – he stepped on the fourth tee and went bogey-bogey-bogey and stayed at eight under for the rest of his day.
Young’s round was so very different. No one started better than this American nearly man, who started in 20th position and played the front nine in 29 strokes in the calmest conditions of the morning. For that matter, few did as well as him on the way in, either.
But standing on the 18th tee, at 10 under par, it went wrong. He drove into a pot bunker and then sought to attack the green from 180 yards short, only to thrash his shot into the face of the trap. Playing his third from the adjacent rough, Young’s third went into sand by the green and a bogey gave him an awful lot to think about on the two-hour wait for the later groups to finish.
Thankfully for Young, the wind was up. And when the wind is up on a baked links course, you have chaos and bogeys. Si Woo Kim avoided them for 10 holes and reached 10 under par, meaning he, Burns, Young and Fox all led at some point or other.
That he finished on six under told a story about the pressures of leading; that Bryson DeChambeau triple-bogeyed the 11th and capitulated to a 72 was possibly a different story about karma.
Had Scheffler birdied the 18th and reached nine under, who knows what kind of tremors that would have sent through the field. But instead he bogeyed and signed for a 67 and settled for seven under. Perhaps Fox wouldn’t have blinked anyway.
His round was steady in an even-par 34 for the front and a masterful clinic in rising at opportune moments on the back. Birdies at the 13th and 14th gave him his first taste of the lead and two more in the final three holes, when the pulse was thumping hardest, were the crowning moments of a champion.
Written in the stars, maybe, or more likely the DNA.
