OK so the first round of the British Open (or The Open) is in the books. Lots of surprised for sure and I am sure of lot of people's picks may have not fared so well. Golf is a difficult sport to predict. Now I happen to be in the camp of picks who may already be out of it after the first round. I stuck my neck out and picked Hunter Mahan who had a disastrous round and is currently at 5 over, 10 behind the leader. My previous post mentioned some statistics of the first round scores of winners in the last 30 years.
The amazing thing is that of my list of 20 that I picked to win only Hunter Mahan (who I narrowed down to my final winner) is the only one that is not within 7 shots!!!! (I believe this to be the magic number that the winner must be within the leader after 1st round).
Here is the post with my original list of 20:
http://lostroadworld.blogspot.com/2011/07/narrowed-my-list-of-british-open.html
So I already lost out with Mahan so I decided to revise my 20 and pick a new winner based on the new stats after the first round. The most notable stat is that the final winner usually is behind the leader by 2-4 shots after the first round (this would make a score of between 3 to 1 under). So my new list.
Darren Clarke, Northern Ireland (my pick for best chance for British win)
Graeme McDowell, Northern Ireland
Martin Kaymer, Germany (my pick to be in the hunt)
Ian Poulter, England
Adam Scott, Australia (who I wanted to win)
Bubba Watson, USA (my pick to be in the hunt)
Robert Rock, England
Of these guys I still have 2 guys I picked to be in the hunt before the tournament : Martin Kaymer and Bubba Watson (also had Adam Scott and Darren Clarke in my last 8 to win).
My new winner is (if I picked with my head) : Martin Kaymer
If I used my heart : Adam Scott (because he is an Aussie)
NOTE: I got a lot of comments on twitter that history could be made, just so people know I would love to see history made, this analysis is just an academic exercise and I love sports stats!
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