British Open Tee-Times: Pádraig Harrington will get his British Open defence under way at 7.58am on Thursday morning when he tees off at Royal Birkdale in the company of double US Open champion Retief Goosen and 1997 Open champion Justin Leonard.
Harrington comes into the third major of the year in the same manner he did 12 months ago - as current Irish PGA champion. While Graeme McDowell was busy notching up his fourth European Tour win at the lucrative Scottish Open in Loch Lomond, Harrington contested the Irish PGA Championship at The European Club in Wicklow.
The world number 14 closed with a 72 for a one-over 285 aggregate to win by four shots from Philip Walton at The European. The Open champion welcomed a return to winning ways plus the benefit of competing on such a testing links as The European one week before the Open. And who can doubt the Dubliner's methods, it worked 12 months ago.
"It is always better to get a winning feeling," Harrington said, after picking up the trophy and €10,000 winner's cheque on Saturday. McDowell won €631,044 for winning in Scotland. "It is a habit and not a bad habit to stick with. I haven't won for seven or eight months now. It is always a nice feeling."
Walton, 46, who pushed Harrington all the way, has shown a wonderful return to form in recent weeks and booked his pace in the Open at Final Local Qualifying last week. In the final throw of the dice the 1995 Ryder Cup hero won the qualifying at West Lancashire Golf Club with rounds of 72, 70. He tees it up at 11.52am on Thursday alongside New Zealand's David Smail and American Michael Letzig.
Damien McGrane will be the first Irishman to take to the course at 7.03am alongside American Jerry Kelly and Darren Fichardt from South Africa.
McDowell gets under way at 12.36pm with South Africa's Rory Sabbatini and 2004 Open champion Todd Hamilton from America for company.
Sergio Garcia and Ernie Els are the two favourites in the absence through injury of Tiger Woods and they are at opposite ends of the draw.
Els is an early starter, going out at 8.31am with American Scott Verplank and rising German star Martin Kaymer, but Garcia has to wait until 2.31pm to begin his campaign.
The Spaniard, runner-up in the European Open two weeks ago, has Japan's Ryuji Imada and American Sean O'Hair in his group.
The distinction of hitting the first shot at 6.30am falls to Australian Craig Parry, while the last group of English qualifiers Jonathan Lomas and Peter Appleyard and Japan's Yoshinobu Tsukada are not teeing off until 4.21pm and could struggle to finish before darkness if play is slow.
First Round Tee-times for the British Open which gets under way on Thursday at Royal Birkdale(Irish in Bold)
0630 Lucas Glover (USA), Craig Parry (Aus), Simon Dyson
0641 Jean-Baptiste Gonnet (Fra), Pat Perez (USA), Peter Fowler (Aus)
0652 Soren Kjeldsen (Den), Brendan Jones (Aus), Matt Kuchar (USA)
0703 Jerry Kelly (USA), Darren Fichardt (Rsa),
Damien McGrane
0714 Graeme Storm, Scott Strange (Aus), Sandy Lyle
0725 Richard Green (Aus), Mark Calcavecchia (USA), Anders Hansen (Den)
0736 Tom Watson (USA), Justin Rose, Aaron Baddeley (Aus)
0747 Geoff Ogilvy (Aus), Oliver Wilson, Davis Love III (USA)
0758 Retief Goosen (Rsa),
Pádraig Harrington, Justin Leonard (USA)
0809 Richard Sterne (Rsa), Henrik Stenson (Swe), Jeff Quinney (USA)
0820 Hunter Mahan (USA), Vijay Singh (Fij), Reinier Saxton (Ned)
0831 Martin Kaymer (Ger), Scott Verplank (USA), Ernie Els (Rsa)
0842 David Howell, Andres Romero (Arg), J.B. Holmes (USA)
0858 Lee Westwood, KJ Choi (Kor), Ben Curtis (USA)
0909 Nick O'Hern (Aus), Ian Poulter, Paul Goydos (USA)
0920 Phil Mickelson (USA), Hideto Tanihara (Jpn), Paul Casey
0931 Boo Weekley (USA), Colin Montgomerie, Mike Weir (Can)
0942 Toru Taniguchi (Jpn), Richard Finch, John Daly (USA)
0953 David Duval (USA), Simon Khan, David Frost (Rsa)
1004 Rich Beem (USA), Pelle Edberg (Swe), Thomas Sherreard
1015 Michoi Matsumura (Jpn), Tom Gillis (USA), Barry Hume
1026 Shintaro Kai (Jpn), Tim Petrovic (USA), Dave Horsey
1037 Ariel Canete (Arg), Craig Barlow (USA), Phillip Archer
1048 Jamie Elson, Rohan Blizard (Aus), Jon Bevan
1059 Adam Blyth (Aus), Jamie Howarth, Josh Cunliffe (Rsa)
1110 Thomas Aiken (Rsa), Gary Boyd, Brad Lamb (Aus)
1141 Jean Van de velde (Fra), Steve Webster, Andrew Tampion (Aus)
1152
Philip Walton, David Smail (Nzl), Michael Letzig (USA)
1203 Paul Waring, Hennie Otto (Rsa), Kevin Stadler (USA)
1214 Paul Lawrie, Rocco Mediate (USA), Angel Cabrera (Arg)
1225 Niclas Fasth (Swe), Mark O'Meara (USA), Michael Campbell (Nzl)
1236
Graeme McDowell, Rory Sabbatini (Rsa), Todd Hamilton (USA)
1247 Jim Furyk (USA), Nick Dougherty, Camilo Villegas (Col)
1258 Robert Karlsson (Swe), Greg Norman (Aus), Woody Austin (USA)
1309 Robert Allenby (Aus), Steve Stricker (USA), Benjamin Hebert (Fra)
1320 Adam Scott (Aus), Zach Johnson (USA), Pablo Larrazabal (Spa)
1331 Gregory Havret (Fra), Tim Clark (Rsa), Stewart Cink (USA)
1342 Wen-chong Liang (Chn), Fredrik Jacobson (Swe), Jeff Overton (USA)
1353 Trevor Immelman (Rsa), Soren Hansen (Den), Anthony Kim (USA)
1409 Miguel Angel Jimenez (Spa), Stephen Ames (Can), Charles Howell III (USA)
1420 Peter Hanson (Swe), Bart Bryant (USA), Rodney Pampling (Aus)
1431 Ryuji Imada (Jpn), Sergio Garcia (Spa), Sean O'Hair (USA)
1442 Stuart Appleby (Aus), Brandt Snedeker (USA), Ross Fisher
1453 Azuma Yano (Jpn), Johan Edfors (Swe), Tom Lehman (USA)
1504 Simon Wakefield, Jay Williamson (USA), James Kingston (Rsa)
1515 Gregory Bourdy (Fra), Danny Chia (Mal), John Rollins (USA)
1526 Prayad Marksaeng (Tha), Chris Wood, Scott McCarron (USA)
1537 Anthony Wall, Alexander Noren (Swe), Ewan Porter (Aus)
1548 Peter Baker, Hiroshi Iwata (Jpn), Alex Cejka (Ger)
1559 Douglas Labelle (USA), Chih-bing Lam (Sin), Jose-Filipe Lima (Por)
1610 Martin Wiegele (Aut), Angelo Que (Phi), Doug McGuigan
1621 Jonathan Lomas, Yoshinobu Tsukada (Jpn), Peter Appleyard
