Nick Dougherty: Return to Misery Hill will be emotional

Jul 13 2008 Euan Mclean

HE calls it Misery Hill and Nick Dougherty should know after spending more hours on Royal Birkdale's windswept practice range than Vanessa Feltz at the dinner table.

The prestigious Southport links is where the young Dougherty learned his trade through hours of hard graft in all kinds of punishing conditions.

If bad weather rolls in over the next few days his fellow Open competitors will get a taste of what Dougherty had to contend with to get to where he is now.

Not that the Englishman, who missed the cut at the Scottish Open on Friday, would wish his current situation on his worst enemy.

It's almost three months since Nick's mum Ennis died suddenly after suffering a heart attack on holiday in America - and the scars just starting to heal will inevitably be re-opened by returning to his roots.

Even before the loss of his mother the 26-year-old was preparing to deal with the added pressure of performing in front of a home crowd because he failed to cope last time The Open was in his backyard two years ago at Royal Liverpool.

But if lessons were learned from Hoylake in 2006 another look back to that week can offer inspiration in the shape of Chris Di Marco. The American was grieving after losing his mother Norma but found immeasurable strength in his sadness, claiming she was looking down on him as he pushed Tiger Woods all the way.

If Dougherty can summon a similar reaction he knows it would be a fitting tribute to the woman who supported him fully as he strove on Misery Hill to realise his dream of a career in golf.

But he is all too aware he must be careful how much emotion he lets in this week in case it sweeps away his chances of winning. Dougherty said: "It's a difficult one.

Certainly it will be special to have so much goodwill behind me but the last thing I want to do is start playing from my heart.

"There is a lot going on with me just now and the Liverpool contingent will be well aware of what has happened with my family.

"But I have to make sure I don't let that get in the way of my golf.

"It's better to go there in business mode but inevitably it will be hard not to think about my mum.

"To a certain degree it will spur me on because the encouragement I'll get will be superb.

It would be the perfect scenario to be inspired like DiMarco was at Hoylake, to feel like mum's looking down and take strength from that.

"There's no reason why I can't feel that but to go there expecting it to happen only puts more pressure on me and I don't need that.

"I've not been playing well and have to turn it around but to do so I need to back off myself.

"It would be a beautiful thing to walk down the 18th and win The Open in a tough year like this but that's an emotional thing for me so I have to be careful and make sure I stick to business.

"At Hoylake I didn't deal with the support and let it get on top of me.

"I wanted to play well so much to repay the crowd for their backing and sadly my game didn't balance up in comparison to what they were giving me.

"It made it more difficult because I didn't focus on just doing my thing and got carried away with it.

"Hopefully I've learned from that and this time will make sure I don't carry the burden of being desperate to perform for all those people.

"I have to concentrate on just doing it for myself.

"It's not a case of blotting out the crowd completely because there will be certain instances when it will give me a boost and carry me along.

"But if I let myself get sucked into trying to play well just for them there's a good chance I will come unstuck and not do what they expect of me anyway."

There are some things Nick would do well not to ignore as every corner of Birkdale offers special inspiration for him, not least years worth of local knowledge on the course.

But he admits it will be that first step back on to Misery Hill that is sure to raise a smile.

Nick said: "I used to go there every Saturday and the weather was usually terrible. All I remember is hitting countless balls in the howling wind, freezing cold and rain.

"They have taken the trees away now which means there's even less shelter when the weather comes in.

"I'm sure it will bring back so mememories when I step back on to that range.

I've come a long way since then and Birkdale will always be special to me because it's where I learned the game.

"My first professional instructor was Richard Bradbury, the head pro until he retired a few years ago, who looked after me from when I was just a nipper.

"I was 10 when I first went there and learned from him until about 15 so I spent many an hour on Misery Hill hitting balls under his watchful eye.

"When I was young my dad was so bloody hard on me that Richard was always a soft touch.

"He's a lovely guy and a wonderful instructor who played a massive part in my development.

"I'm indebted to him and it's nice to go back to the place that was so special to him - his life was Royal Birkdale and to play in The Open is pretty cool.

"I'm sure he'll be back there for the tournament and I can't wait to see him."