Life Goes On
‘It never haunted me’: Jean van de Velde delivers great answer about ’99 Open collapse in return to Carnoustie
For better or worse (mostly worse), Jean van de Velde is best known for what he didn’t win. Leading the 1999 British Open at Carnoustie by three strokes standing on the 18th tee, van de Velde staged one of the most gut-wrenching collapses in golf history after his approach shot struck a grandstand railing, ricocheting into deep fescue. His attempted recovery flew into the Barry Burn, from which he was forced to take a shoeless, sockless drop, consequently hitting into the front greenside bunker. He got up and down for triple bogey from there, falling into a three-way playoff with Justin Leonard and Paul Lawrie, which Lawrie would go on to win.
This week, the Frenchman returned to the site of his infamous implosion for the Senior Open Championship, where he was asked about the events of that fateful Sunday 25 years ago. Instead of lamenting the past or refusing to address it, however, van de Velde looked his greatest failure straight in the eyes and delivered one of the most grounded answers you can possibly imagine. Check it out.
A classy answer from a classy guy. Van de Velde freely admits he was “highly disappointed” in the wake of the ’99 Open, but there’s honesty and conviction in his words when he says “it’s never haunted me and it’s not about to start.” He understands that his collapse was the product of both the uncontrollable (his ball ricocheting the way it did off the grandstand) and bad decision making (not laying up in the first place), but that’s golf and golf is a thing we do, not the thing we are.
So here’s hoping van de Velde has a pleasant, burn-less return to Carnoustie this week. It might be too much to hope for true redemption, but it doesn’t seem like van de Velde is looking for that anyway.