The weather may determine the winner at the Open!

Yesterday I talked about the importance of today's weather conditions in determining who will have the advantage going into the weekend at the Open Championship. Friday's weather was not even close to being the same as Thursday! Very early players on Friday did get a tremendous break from the weather, as did the early players on Thursday.

Louis Oosthuizen, for example, received the gift of a lifetime Friday morning when he was able to play in no wind and light rain, so the greens actually held shots. The wind then picked up so quickly after he finished that the officials suspended play for an hour and six minutes. If the wind had not died down a little so play could continue, officials would have canceled the entire second round for Friday, canceling Louis's round of 67! As things stand as of this writing, Louis will have a tremendous lead over the field starting Saturday's round because players are fighting just to make pars Friday afternoon.

After play continued, the average scores increased by three shots per player over the players who finished before the suspension! Scoring difficulty increased tremendously after play resumed. Rory McIlroy, for example, had shot 63 on Thursday, 9 under par, but then hit the windy conditions Friday and was +8 through 16 holes for the day when I discontinued following Friday's round!

After all players finish their rounds Friday evening, it will be interesting to see what score is required to make the cut for the weekend.