Tour Life

Tommy Fleetwood learned the game a few miles from Royal Birkdale. A profile of the Southport local and what an Open win at home would mean.

Tom Kim entered the 2026 Scottish Open ranked outside the world’s top 40. He shot a bogey-free 64 on Sunday at The Renaissance Club to win his first tournament in three years. He arrives at Royal Birkdale this week as the most in-form player in the field. Here’s how a player who had briefly looked like a lost prodigy became, in the span of a single Sunday, the story of the summer.

The 154th Open Championship tees off Thursday at Royal Birkdale in Southport. Scottie Scheffler arrives as world number one and +700 favourite. Rory McIlroy arrives with links form and a T4 memory of 2017. Tommy Fleetwood arrives as the local, wanting the story of a lifetime. The final men’s major of 2026 has the field it deserved.

Before Sunday at Aronimink, Aaron Rai was professional golf’s most underrated technician — a Wolverhampton-born Englishman of Sikh and Kenyan-Indian heritage who hit fairways for a living and made very little noise doing it. The major championship that announced him to the world was a long time coming. Here’s how he got here.

He has more second-place finishes in the last two years than most players collect in a decade. Cameron Young is the best player in the world without a major. That’s not a knock. It’s a pressure that would break most people — and he keeps showing up.

The second major of 2026 begins Thursday at Aronimink Golf Club in Pennsylvania. Rory McIlroy arrives as reigning Masters champion. Scottie Scheffler arrives as defending PGA champion. One of them is about to do something that will take a long time to forget.