Shinnecock Hills course will be toughest of the year, but real examination comes from the galleriesShinnecock Hills, in Southampton, New York, hosts the 126th US Open. Photograph: Bruce Bennett/Getty Images Sun Jun 14 2026 - 06:00 • 5 MIN READAs each and every golfer headed to Shinnecock Hills on New York’s Long Island will be aware, the examination posed by the United States Golf Association who run the US Open for next week’s 126th edition of the championship will be the toughest golf test faced by any of them all year.That’s simply the USGA way, with a mandate to stick to a philosophy that the course set-up each year should include quite brutal rough, lightning-fast greens and narrowing fairways, where par is often the desired winning score. None more so than at Shinnecock Hills, where in five previous stagings of the US Open, only three players – Retief Goosen, Phil Mickelson and Raymond Floyd – have managed to beat par.But knowing how tough the examination will be is something every player knows in advance. In some ways, that could be the easy part. The potentially more difficult task could be in dealing with the notoriously abrasive New York sports fans, with the behaviour exhibited at last year’s Ryder Cup at Bethpage – at the other end of Long Island – sufficiently fresh in the memory banks to serve as a warning of what could lie ahead.The Ryder Cup is the Ryder Cup and not a Major championship, a standalone event where jingoism can spill beyond the fairway ropes. Yet, as history has shown us, past US Opens in New York have featured episodes where players have found themselves on the wrong end of interactions from the galleries.When the 1986 US Open was played at Shinnecock Hills, Greg Norman reached the end of his tether and invited a heckler to meet him in the car park.During the 2002 US Open at Bethpage Black, Sergio Garcia – who emerged as a challenger to Tiger Woods – was subjected to verbal abuse and even had spectators raise fists to him in a threatening manner. As the Spaniard took what seemed an eternity to hit balls, waggling the club before finally getting into the swing, the fans became abusive.“You can’t control them, unfortunately, and there’s people like that everywhere in the whole world. If not, the world would be too perfect ... the people had to realise that we’re trying as hard as we can out there, and sometimes they make some stupid comments,” Garcia would later say.That same 2002 US Open also saw Golf Digest magazine distribute buttons that read Be Nice to Monty, given how Colin Montgomerie had so frequently been on the wrong end of comments from American golf fans. The gesture didn’t work, however, as the Scot again was repeatedly subjected to comments about his weight and compared to Mrs Doubtfire (the character played by Robin Williams in the film of that name) – taunting which had first manifested at the 1999 Ryder Cup at Brookline.Retief Goosen of South Africa on the 18th green at the Shinnecock Hills US Open on June 20th, 2004. Photograph: Jamie Squire/Getty Images And en route to winning the US Open at Shinnecock Hills in 2004, South African Refief Goosen – who had the temerity to outplay fan favourite Mickelson – was subjected to verbal taunting that ironically only served to fuel his fire.“Some of the things people were saying to me in my face from the green to the tee was very unsportsmanlike. But in a way, that made me more determined to fight my way through and win this thing and battle that negativity,” Goosen would remark of dealing with the crowd’s behaviour.Caddie Colin Byrne, the Dubliner who was on the Springbok’s bag for that victory, was hugely impressed with how his player went about his business in that final round, where Goosen – on impossibly fast greens where some players putted balls off greens and even into bunkers – single-putted the final six greens.Byrne recalled: “As the day went on, the crowd got mouthier and more aggressive. They were hurling a lot of abuse at Retief. Probably the worst thing you could do to him if you wanted to put him off is insult him, because that’ll make him stronger. That’s actually what the crowd did. It made him more determined and stronger. He was feeding off of their bad energy. You could see more resilience. The harder you pushed him, the tougher he was.“In true fashion, when it was over, his only celebration was I think he doffed his cap in a little more aggressive manner than he would normally do, and that was it. It was a gracious victory, as he normally is. No excessive celebration.”There are 88 American players and 68 non-Americans in the field for this latest US Open championship at Shinnecock Hills and, while they can anticipate the New York galleries to live up to a reputation for rowdiness, the other certainty is that the course will again provide the toughest examination of any of the Majors. After all, Shinnecock Hills too has a reputation to live up to.Rory McIlroy paid an advance visit to play the course on the Monday of the Memorial tournament week and liked what he saw.Rory McIlroy during the second round of the 2018 US Open at Shinnecock Hills. Photograph: Streeter Lecka/Getty Images “The fairways are more generous than they were in 2018. But the first cut of rough is five inches long. It’s like the first cut is maybe three paces wide and then it gets into the fescue. If you miss the fairway even by a yard, you’re going to [be in trouble]. The fairways are very, very generous. So, if you miss the fairway, I feel like you deserve a bad lie,” he said.[ Rory McIlroy puts focus on driver issues ahead of US Open bidOpens in new window ]Of the greens, which were at a speed of 11 on the stimp at the time of his reconnaissance visit, McIlroy said: “I really don’t think they need to get much faster. I think if they can keep them at that green speed, they can get them firm, and they can use the hole locations that they want to use without having some of the struggles that they have had the last couple of US Opens.“To me, it’s all about them just maintaining the green speeds really where they are and not getting them too out of hand. If it’s set up the right way, I think it’s one of the best championship tests in the country. I mean, it’s an amazing golf course.”The previous US Opens at Shinnecock Hills also serve to forewarn those with ambitions. Although the first championship on the links was held in 1896 – when Scotland’s James Foulis won what was a 36-holes strokeplay championship – the modern US Opens at the venue serve as indicators of the difficult challenge ahead. Floyd was one under when winning in 1986; Corey Pavin won with even par in 1995; Goosen won in four under in 2004; and Brooks Koepka was one over in 2018.IN THIS SECTION