Before teeing off at The Open on Thursday, two-time major winner Bryson DeChambeau was on track to complete the “Grand Slam of missing cuts” at the majors this season. However, after the first round at Royal Birkdale, the 32-year-old found himself close to the top of the leaderboard. Jackson Suber led R1 at -5 (65), while DeChambeau shot -3 (67), trailing him by two strokes. While he refused to speak to the media for the fifth consecutive major round, in a conversation with an Open Championship representative, DeChambeau subtly clapped back at Sir Nick Faldo for claiming he had no clue about links strategy. 

“I’d say it to his face,” said Faldo before the Open Championship. “He has zero clue of strategy. He said [last year], ‘I’m going to go out and attack the links.’ I was speechless. Well, I’ve never ‘attacked’ a links course… You don’t think, ‘I’ll just bomb it down there; I can’t see where I’m going; it’s 20 yards wide.’ Oh yeah, good luck.”

Well, Bryson DeChambeau appeared to have taken the criticism personally and offered a very pointed remark after his first round. “I think you’ve got to be a lot more ‘strategic’ out on the golf course,” DeChambeau said with a lacerating sarcasm in his voice. “I feel like I did a really good job today of being incredibly ‘STRATEGIC’ and focused super hard on placing it in the right places. Besides 18, I placed the ball in some good areas. I just need to hit more fairways. Other than that, I feel like my ‘strategy’ was nice today.”

Although the American didn’t explicitly name Nick Faldo, it immediately became clear who the message was really for. DeChambeau emphasized the word ‘strategic’ three times in that short 18-second comment. Perhaps more interesting is the fact that the comment reached who it was intended for: Nick Faldo, who was on the Sky Sports broadcast. The six-time major winnerdidn’t waste any time before offering a response either, and it was as surprising as it gets. 

“I think I rattled his cage,” Faldo said in the Sky Sports broadcast, claiming his share of credit in fuelling DeChambeau to play great. “He has basically stuck you know what up and said, ‘Faldo, I do have strategy.’ So I am taking claim that I switched on the strategy play.” But did he really “switch on” the strategist in DeChambeau?

Somewhat it seems. DeChambeau used the driver only on nine holes and averaged 331 yards off the tee. But the biggest improvement came in his iron game. With his new 3D-printed irons, he hit 83.3% of the greens in regulation, the second-highest in the field. Furthermore, DeChambeau avoided all the bunkers and ranked first in the field in sand-trap avoidance. The way he handled the firm conditions encouraged Nick Faldo, who suggested that smart course management was key to DeChambeau’s success.

However, a key factor to remember here is last year’s performance. DeChambeau finished tied for 10th after 18 holes. But when he teed off for the second round at Royal Portrush, he shot a 7-over 78. This left him scrambling to make the cut.

It remains to be seen what Friday brings for the Crushers GC captain. He has historically struggled when the wind picks up, and on Thursday, at least when DeChambeau played, the winds weren’t as strong as they are typical for the Open Championship. And the firm conditions sans the wind might help DeChambeau, according to Paul McGinley, who disagreed with Faldo’s comments. 

“I would just go back to the comments of Nick Faldo about him not having strategy. He does have a strategy,” the Ryder Cup-winning captain said. “So the strategy that he has is very much around wrestling this golf course to its knees by using the biggest armory that he has, which is the driver, and that is a strategy in itself… So his strategy is a lot more cavalier, but because the rough is down this week and there are not huge amounts of gorse out there, [so] he can get away with that. We saw him win at Pinehurst [2024 U.S. Open] in very firm conditions. So let’s not dismiss Bryson.”

If DeChambeau makes the cut, he will also prove three-time PGA Tour winner Johnson Wagner wrong. Wagner, who is now an analyst for CBS, joked in a podcast that DeChambeau would fail to book the weekend spot at Royal Birkdale. He jokingly said Bryson would complete his grand slam of missed cuts—he has missed cuts in the first three majors—at Merseyside.

Quite a lot is on line for Bryson on Friday. His playing partner, Scottie Scheffler, was T14 with a 2-under-par 68 on Thursday. If DeChambeau can maintain his impressive form for the rest of the week, he could claim his third major title and first since winning the 2024 U.S. Open.