Congressional Confessional - Ernie Els

A few days before the start of the 1997 US Open Ernie Els and his then coach Robert Baker were plotting their way around Congressional Country Club's revered Blue Course. They reached the par-four 17th, arguably the toughest hole on the course and given the nature of major championship golf, one that would probably play a pivotal role in determining the winner of this 97th US Open.

Ernie dropped a ball in the middle of the fairway at around typical driving distance. At that time it was a 5-iron into a narrow sliver of a green with water guarding the left and back portion of the putting surface – very dangerous, very USGA. A soft draw was the perfect shot to what they anticipated would be Sunday's high tariff, back-left pin position. Ernie pushed one shot right. He then hit another to the same spot. At the third attempt he produced the perfect shot and his ball arced from right to left and thudded down into the centre of the rock-hard green, gently rolling towards the imaginary pin location. Job done. Time to move on.

A week later I travelled to Florida to shoot a magazine feature with Ernie. Robert Baker was there, too. He'd videoed those practice shots on Congressional's 17th hole and now he showed me the footage. It was not the sort of moment one forgets. The shiny US Open trophy was glinting next to us on the kitchen table of Ernie's Lake Nona home. He had won his second US Open and, yes, the 17th hole was what had sealed it for him. That Sunday, in the heat of the battle, he produced the shot of his life. A 5-iron, a soft draw, just as they'd rehearsed it a few days before. Foresight and circumstance had come together in perfect harmony. It doesn't get sweeter than that. “Yeah, we kind of knew that could well be a crucial hole when it came down to it,” comments Ernie. “With that pin position on Sunday, the 17th wasn't ever going to be a birdie hole, not realistically anyway. Making par there was huge as it happened, because pretty much everyone else was making bogey or worse.”

Tom Lehman was one of them. The third round leader and reigning Open champion had blown his chances when he sent his Titleist for an early bath on this penultimate hole. Ernie's playing companion Colin Montgomerie bogeyed it, too. Ernie walked to the 18th tee, at that time a par three over water, with a one-shot lead. Much could happen still. “I just thought to myself, ‘please God don't hit it in the water'!” jokes Ernie. He didn't. A solid shot into the centre of the green and a nerveless two-putt kept Monty's challenge at bay and Ernie was a two-time major champion.

“The thing that week, the really big thing, was my putting,” recalls Ernie. “We had to finish our third rounds on Sunday morning and I hit some key shots to make birdie on 15 and 17, but the par saves were even more important. I made some really big saves and that gave me a lot of belief going into my final round that afternoon.

You need that belief in any tournament, but especially in the final round of a major championship.” History still reminds us that Ernie had soft hands and nerves of steel that final day. He holed a chip on the 10th hole for birdie, which gave him a share of the lead, and he kept holing putts. “I made a few nice little knee-knockers coming down the stretch,” he says with almost a cheeky smile. “Even the putt on 18 was no gimme, it was at least four feet, but I hit a sweet putt right into the heart of the cup.”

Ernie was 27 years old. With his second US Open in the bag, he played sublime golf that summer and with Greg Norman and Tiger the three of them had a bit of a ding-dong battle for the No.1 spot. They traded places almost on a weekly basis. For much of the first half of 1998 Ernie was the No.1 ranked player.

Few could have foreseen, least of all Ernie that he would not make it to the top spot again. Equally, few could have predicted that Tiger would win 14 majors. “I played for ten years when that guy dominated,” says Ernie. “He won 14 majors. Think about that, 14 majors and in such a short period of time. For guys like myself, Phil, Vijay, Davis, Fred Couples, to have played under a guy who was that good, we took a beating, not only from him, but from the media, too. It was a tough 10, 12 years for us. Maybe if Tiger hadn't come along I'd have maybe won six or seven majors. Who knows?”

Who knows, indeed? One thing we do know is that back in 1997 Ernie went into the US Open with no great form to speak of. His PGA Tour results were poor, with only a couple of top-10s all season, and the week before the US Open he missed the cut in the Kemper Open. The omens weren't great, but his golf at Congressional was. There are parallels with Ernie's form this season. Golf being the funny game that it is, perhaps Congressional could light a spark in his game as it did in 1997.

“Overall my game has actually been pretty good for a while,” says Ernie. “You're always working on things and trying to get better. That's the nature of the game. I'm not changing things in the way Tiger has and actually, on that point, I have to say I have a lot of respect for what Tiger is trying to do. But as a player you have to keep working on things. I think that's something the average golfer doesn't fully understand.

We're not like robots; we can't turn up and play the same every day. Things change, your body changes, your swing changes. But the key thing for me is the putting. The game is still fun, but I could do with making some putts. That's why I'm not having four good rounds the same week. I'm not making enough putts.” Ernie shouldn't have any trouble getting re-acquainted with Congressional's greens, but much else about this course has been re-configured since 1997.

The USGA was not a huge fan of a par-three closing hole for a major championship. “With a PGA Tour-level player, you let them put a mid-iron in their hand, they're not going to hit it in the water,” says Mike Davis, senior director of rules and competitions at the USGA. So, the original 17th is now the 18th, although significantly extended in terms of its length, and the old par-three 18th has become the 10th, still a par-three but running in the opposite direction.

Ernie has defended over 60 professional titles in his 20-plus years on tour and going back to the scene of a major win is extra special. “Yeah, obviously I'm looking forward to going back for the US Open for all sorts of reasons. I've played the course in its new configuration and I like what they've done. It's a different golf course now, especially finishing on the old 17th hole. That might suit me!”

What definitely suits Ernie is life in Florida. He has a beautiful family home at the Bear's Club in Jupiter and the quality of life could not be better. “The kids love it here,” beams Ernie, “and Ben goes to a nice school and is doing great. He'll be nine years old this year and he's starting to say some words, forming sentences and so on. The move has been good for him. It's been good for all of us.”

Ernie doesn't tend to talk much about Ben or how his diagnosis for autism has impacted on the family, but clearly this was the main driving force behind the move to the US. The fact is there are better programmes in the US for Ben – better than anywhere else in the world, in fact.

“At first, you think you've been knocked down by the man upstairs,” says Ernie. “It is a challenge at first. But when you find your feet, it really is a blessing. It's a special way of life. These kids are special people. And Ben is such a pure kid. He doesn't have the normal problems as other kids. He doesn't know anything else. He just knows his own little world. I almost feel like we're blessed to have Ben because he's such a pure, honest, no-B.S. kid.”

Ernie and his wife Liezl are now actively engaged in a $30 million capital campaign to raise funds for a new Els Centre of Excellence for the research and global treatment of autism. It will be the first facility of its kind in the world. Already they have put $6 million of their own money into it and through events such as the Els for Autism Pro Am and the Els for Autism Golf Challenge, more money is pouring in.

“We want to provide something for the whole community,” says Ernie. “When these kids turn 14, they then don't have to go to normal school. We can provide something for them till the age of 21, a proper facility so they can develop as young adults and have the best future they can possibly have. And the research will enable us to see if we can find out why autism happens to certain kids.”

It's quite a portfolio that Ernie oversees – Els for Autism, Ernie Els Design, Ernie Els Wines, the Ernie Els & Fancourt Foundation – but Els the Golfer still gets the vast majority of his attention. “I get asked all the time about retirement,” says Ernie with the quiet resignation of a man with 25 years of weekly press conferences under his belt. “Of course, it's going to happen one day, maybe sooner than some players because personally the Seniors Tour is not something that appeals to me right now. But I've got a few good years left in the tank. I honestly think I have another major or two in me, but I have to get my putting back on the right track. That's the key.”

Ernie, having turned 40 in October 2009, takes heart and indeed inspiration from the deeds of others. “Jack Nicklaus won his 18th major at the age of 46 and that gives a lot of hope to us 40-somethings,” says Ernie. “There's been a lot of majors won by guys in their 40s; Hogan, Vijay, Mark O'Meara, but obviously what Jack did was amazing. I know these things are debatable, but the '86 Masters is the best major I ever saw. I can remember it clearly. I was sitting at home with my dad and my mom. It got so late that she went to bed. But my dad and myself, we watched it right to the end. I wanted to see my idol win a major and I count myself lucky to have witnessed it.”

Ernie joined his idol in the Hall of Fame this year. “It's funny,” says Ernie, “because lifetime achievement awards are usually conferred on athletes and actors post-career. Maybe if I'd taken another path early in my life and chosen a sport such as tennis or cricket, I'd be considered a bit of a relic by now. But golfers, we're lucky. At 41 years old I feel physically in great shape. I'd like to hit it a bit further, but I'm still long enough so that's not a problem. Like I said before, I just need to putt better, especially if I want to win majors. This year I've looked at old videos when I putted very aggressively. I need to get that back again and that's what I'm working on.” Ernie with a hot putter is a dangerous beast.

And he's still hungry!