HOYLAKE, England (AP) β Ben Crane traveled 24 hours to get to Royal Liverpool and he might not even get to play in the British Open.
Crane is the first alternate for the Open. He didn’t learn until Tuesday that players ahead of him on the reserve list were not coming over. So he scrambled to get a flight from Portland, Oregon, to Seattle to New York to London. Unable to get a flight to the northwest of England, he drove more than three hours to Hoylake.
He couldn’t hit balls because the practice range is a seven-minute car ride and he has to be ready to go at a minute’s notice if someone withdraws.
And he still was smiling. Crane said being on a links course was “good for the soul.”
