USGA bites the bitter pill, US Open September date without qualifiers

18 May 2020: The USGA announced today that the US Open at the Winged Foot Golf Club will go ahead without the traditional qualifiers. Amidst the health and safety concerns surrounding COVID19, the USGA released a moderated championship schedule for 2020

It is expected that the 120th U.S. Women’s Amateur will be conducted from August 3-9 at the Woodmont Country Club. The 120th U.S. Amateur, scheduled for August 10-16 is also expected to go ahead as planned at the Bandon Dunes Golf Resort in Oregon.

In a release issued today, USGA offered their plans to conducted just four championships this year. Earlier in April, the USGA announced that the 120th U.S. Open will be played at the Winged Foot Golf Club New York, from Sept. 17-20. The USGA asserted that testing as well as robust health and safety protocols will be in place at each of the four championships.

Given continued health and safety concerns, the U.S. Open will be played at Winged Foot Golf Club from Sept. 17-20 without qualifying, which means the field will be filled entirely through exemptions.

— U.S. Open (USGA) (@usopengolf) May 18, 2020

Unfortunately though, all four championships will present a field full of exemptions, as qualifying events have all been canceled. The USGA believes that the hundreds of smaller clubs that host and organise these qualifying events may not be able to deal with the safety requirements as the coronavirus continues to ravage the United States and the rest of the world.

The 2020 U.S. Women’s Amateur and U.S. Amateur will retain their August dates.

The four remaining 2020 USGA amateur championships will be canceled.

No qualifying to be conducted for any 2020 championships.

— USGA (@USGA) May 18, 2020

“This is a decision that was exceptionally difficult. The openness of our championships is our DNA—10,000 people following their dream,” said John Bodenhamer, the USGA’s senior managing director of championships. “It was not on the table at the beginning. We felt confident we could conduct qualifying for everything.”

In the normal course of events, the US Open would have followed 108 sectional qualifiers and 12 final qualifying events. Those final qualifiers were supposed to be held in eight states in the USA, Japan, England and Canada. “Rescheduling that into the fall just wasn’t possible,” added Bodenhamer. “The biggest consideration has been the need to test players, caddies and essential workers inside the so-called bubble. We looked at every single scenario before we decided to cancel anything.”

Another important tradition, a vast amount of volunteers, will also be scaled back significantly. In a normal year, the US Open would see the participation of nearly 6,000 volunteers, but it is expected that the 2020 edition shall feature only 200 of them during constraints related to logistics and testing.

The move will shatter some dreams. There have been three champions who emerged through the qualifiers in the past – Steve Jones in 1996, Michael Campbell in 2005 and Lucas Glover in 2009. Last year alone, there were some 35,000 participants that showed up at qualifiers hoping to find a way into the US Open. The field has already been reduced from 156 to 144, partially to account for lesser daylight in September. The top 60 in the OWGR are eligible to play the US Open besides a host of other exemptions.