Why golf’s most torturous format is also one of its best

In America, as Rory McIlroy used to call the United States, alternate-shot golf shows up in our golf-on-a-screen life a couple of times each year. We see it, as a form of match play, at the Solheim Cup, at the Presidents Cup and at the Ryder Cup — and that’s about it.

But who among us actually has played alternate shot, aka foursomes? The American golf impulse is for an 18-hole individual score on a scorecard at the end of the round, despite the fictions it may contain. Foursomes is to-the-bone Scottish, as golf at its best often is. Oakmont, which will host its 10th U.S. Open next week, is as Scottish as an inland American course could be.

I played in a three-day foursomes event last week at an old, tradition-minded club on the outskirts of Philadelphia, and I’m here to tell you that foursomes is an exquisite form of torture.

On the chance you don’t know it: In foursomes play, you play on a two-person team. One player tees off on the odd-numbered holes and the other the even. After the tee shot, each player plays a shot until the hole is settled. Concessions are common. Coaching abounds, in the name of victory and camaraderie. Teammate to teammate, the most common question is, Where do you want this? The most common post-shot commentary is this quickie: Sorry!

I’ve been asking around, and poking about the internet, trying to learn something about foursomes. It’s a Scottish game, still commonly played at Prestwick, on the west coast of Scotland, where the British Open was played 24 times, though not since 1924. At Muirfield — aka the Honorary Company of Edinburgh Golfers — foursomes is the main everyday game. This is from a Muirfield brochure, available on the club’s website:

“While recognizing the merits of other forms of golf, the club has always preferred match-play to stroke-play and alternate-shot two-ball foursomes to other varieties of competition. Whether in the formal club matches or friendly gatherings, the team ethic and the pace of play of the foursome are at the heart of the club’s activities. The club matches are played level and are remarkably swift, with players and caddies advancing down the fairway ahead of their partners’ drives to be ready to play their second shots as the balls land.”

What a tidy piece of writing.

Golf is to the Scots what soul music is to Americans. They invented this odd cross-country game loved across the world, and they approach every aspect of it in a logical, sane way. The three-hour round. Brown fairways in a dry summer. Tee times for visitor play at every club. Unpretentious writing in club brochures, as in the example above, or this, from the Brora Golf Club website, regarding an unannounced visit by Peter Thomson, the five-time winner of the British Open, and his wife: “They paid their green fee in the pro shop and played away.” You can play foursomes golf at Brora, or whatever other form may wish. But mind the sheep, and get on with it. Eighteen holes of foursomes golf, anywhere is Scotland, is played in two hours and 30 minutes, tops. Lunch calls.

Redemption is a common theme in all of sport, especially team sports, but the wait for redemption can be endless in foursomes play. Let’s say you miss a meaningful short putt. Naturally, you half-dread the next one you face, while recognizing the chance to bury a bad past with a good present. But, given the vagaries of match-play golf, do you know how long you might have to wait to get a next one? It might never arrive, not in that round.

As for the search for a swing that works, foursomes golf promotes similar issues there. Let’s say you hit a wild pull-hook with your drive on 6. The next time you’re on the tee, on 8, it’s a par-3. By the time you get to 10, it’s been forever since you hit a driver. You can barely remember what adjustment you want to make from the drive on 6. It’s damn near impossible to find something. Anything. What you have is . . . your partner.

That’s really the whole thing. You have a partner. Maybe that’s why foursomes golf has never been a thing in American golf. We prize our independence so much. It’s a key aspect (and I would say a great aspect) of our national character.

But when it comes to American golf, we often proceed as kindergartners engaged in parallel play. Even when we’re playing in two-ball, better-ball teams. On every hole, you have the chance to play the hero. There’s teamwork and camaraderie in two-ball better-ball golf, of course. Still, in two-ball golf, everybody is the cleanup hitter. You’re the star of your own movie, at least in your mind.

In the event I played in, the first day was a stroke-play competition that determined what flight you would be in. I am a godfather to my partner’s namesake son, and we’ve been playing golf together for close to 40 years, so we know each other’s moves. In the 10th hole, our tee shot (I played it) was not great but OK. Burt’s second shot was way solid and trickled over a firm green. I hit a lousy chip, Burt hit a super lag putt, I missed from 18 inches, we missed the top flight, where all the glamour is, by a shot.

“I blew it with that chip and with that putt,” I said at dinner.

Burt said he should have talked me into a different club for the chip. Burt cited his putt here, his putt there; his missed fairway here, his missed fairway there; his wrong side of the green here, his wrong side of the green there. He can describe, chapter and verse, every last three-footer I did make, plus some half-decent bunker shots.

Such is the spirit of foursomes golf. It’s not in our national character. Maybe it should be.

Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@Golf.com