THE 154TH OPEN

July 18, 2026

Ryan Gerard

Mixed Zone

Q. It seemed to get increasingly difficult throughout the day.

RYAN GERARD: Yeah, I think 62 was a ridiculously good score given some of those pin placements. Wind kind of picked up at some point, I think probably a little bit before we teed off, but kind of stayed strong throughout the day. Conditions got firm. The margin between good shot and bad shot got increasingly thin.

Didn't really hit too many quality shots on the front and kind of just hung tough, stuck to the strategy, kind of stayed patient, and finally got a putt to go in on 13. I was able to get one up-and-down on 14 and turned kind of a weird one into something positive in the round. Pleased with how we kind of stayed poised all day.

Q. What made the pins so tricky?

RYAN GERARD: They do a lot of this, especially on the weekend, where you kind of get a pin tucked over a bunker or in a corner or up against a ridge, and it's very hard to get to it without hitting a perfect shot or having a perfect angle. Then when you throw in 13- to 15-mile-an-hour winds and firm conditions, it makes it sometimes like on hole 12, the par-3, 30, 35 feet is a great shot in there.

There's not really a one size fits all. Some are tucked over bunkers. Some are tucked just a hair on the green, over a ridge, around a slope or whatever it might be.

They were pretty gnarly today. I'm assuming they're going to be particularly gnarly tomorrow, too. That's part of it. You understand that they're going to use those at some point. They let us off easy the first two days, so you know they had them in their back pocket Saturday and Sunday.

Q. We saw the wind was barely anything this morning, and it got up. Taking that out, did you notice anything different with the fairways or greens at all?

RYAN GERARD: I think the fairways are kind of maxed out on how fast they're running. I don't think they're going to start releasing too much more. You could kind of see a difference maybe Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, but once it hits a certain point, I think they're not really going to get any more brown. I think it's as brown as brown gets. The ball is going to roll as far as it rolls and that's kind of going to be that in the fairways. Greens maybe a little firmer, maybe a hair bumpier. You can tell there's been a ton of traction on them throughout the week, and as they've browned out there's certain spots on some of the newer greens that are dying, unfortunately, and it's leading to some bumpy putts. I watched Cam hit a bunch of good putts that are just bouncing around.

That's just kind of part of it. Going into the weekend, that's going to be the case. Just go out there and take what it gives you and just try and put quality shots after quality shots and make some putts when you get the opportunity to.

Q. How much links golf have you played?

RYAN GERARD: Not a lot. I played when I was young, played a little bit and played Scottish. That's not really a links course. But played there and played North Barrack a couple times and then this week. Not a ton of links golf.

But I think my game kind of suits it. A lot of people have told me that before I even came over here last year. I just feel comfortable flighting shots, hitting different windows, kind of moving the ball both ways when you need to, especially into greens.

I've felt pretty good about the way that we handled business so far, but yeah, it's still a lot of golf left to play, and it's going to be not easy tomorrow.

Q. You've not played in an Open before. You've played quite a lot of majors at this point. And this one being the most different potentially with the turf. How do you prepare for that? What are the things you do? Do you research? How does that work before you get here?

RYAN GERARD: Just kind of roll with the vibes. I've watched a million hours of guys playing links golf from previous Opens to Scottish to whatever the heck they call some of the events they play on the DP World Tour in the mornings. You watch guys play links golf.

We have a very Americanized sort of links that we play, like Bandon Dunes, played a U.S. Amateur there, stuff like that. You get comfortable with the idea of it before you even get here, but the penalty lies within the bunkers and kind of the falloffs around the greens, especially out here. That's something that you can't really understand until you get a couple walks around this golf course.

I feel really good about strategy. Obviously I've started hitting more drivers just because the rough has gotten kind of trampled and thinner, and it's not really that much of a penalty in spots. The biggest thing is avoid X, Y, Z bunker on every hole and just kind of go from there.

Q. I know we asked you the other day about it, but when locals see the name "Gerard" on the leaderboard, was there any songs being sung, any references to their hero?

RYAN GERARD: Oh, yeah. I think some of the kids think I am Steven Gerrard. It's like a Tony Romo situation, played football and then tried to play professional golf.

Yeah, there's quite a few songs. I think some of them I can't repeat. The lads were out in full force today. It's nice to know I'm probably the most hated person in Manchester, and I'm glad we're in Liverpool. It's been a lot of fun.

Yeah, it's kind of funny; it's not even spelled the same, but I'll take it. I'll take any support that we can from across-the-pond folks.

Q. You're not signing Steven Gerrard, though?

RYAN GERARD: No, I'm signing Ryan. Maybe I need to work on my Steven signing. A bunch of little kids think I'm Steven Gerrard, so it's okay.