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Stage is set for Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods
Most of the talk in the build-up to this week's Open has focused on the Tiger and the Golden Bear.
Tiger Woods, the 2000 champion, is the red-hot favourite to clinch a 10th career major while Jack Nicklaus is poised for his swansong in a tournament he first played almost half a century ago.
While the remarkably calm weather on the Fife coastline and the lengthening of the Old Course by 164 yards since the Open was last played here in 2000 have sparked much debate, the fortunes of Woods and Nicklaus have topped the agenda.
World number one Woods, who is scheduled to tee off at 0820 local time (0720 GMT) in Thursday's opening round, has been made a 3-1 favourite by British bookmaker Ladbrokes.
The 29-year-old American, who won his fourth U.S. Masters in April, romped to a runaway victory by eight shots in the 2000 Open championship at St Andrews.
The par-72 layout, despite being stretched with the addition of five new tees since then, remains relatively wide open and the big-hitting Woods will take full advantage if the weather stays calm over the next four days.
St Andrews champions have tended to be prodigious off the tee and highly skilled with regard to the short game -- two departments in which Woods comes up trumps.
Although the long-range forecast for the week is reasonably favourable, afternoon showers are expected on Thursday with the chance of 35 kph winds.
Woods says he is ready for anything that Mother Nature throws his way.
"It doesn't matter either way," he told a news conference this week. "You've got to look at the fact that everybody has to play the same course, and there is a lot of luck to the tee times here, too.
"Hopefully I'm on the good side of the draw, if the wind doesn't pick up or anything like that when it's my time to play.
"But at an Open championship you just don't know what you're going to get," he added. "The unpredictability of this event with the weather conditions makes it that much more appealing to all of us.
"I think that's why we come over here and we enjoy that, because you don't know. You have to play through it and you have to deal with it."
The 65-year-old Nicklaus, who has played in 36 British Opens since making his debut at Royal Troon in 1962, is also unconcerned about the weather.
Whether or not it blows at St Andrews, the Golden Bear is determined to be seen as a genuine competitor this week.
"I am here as a competitor and we'll find out how competitive I can be through to Sunday," said the three-times Open champion.
"It may not be the most realistic scenario but that's what I'm here for.
"The Old Course is a very special place because of what it is and how it relates to the game of golf," added the American, whose last two British Open victories in 1970 and 1978 came here.
"I fell in love with the place straight away. It is very difficult and there's no other course remotely close to it."
With Nicklaus and Woods providing compelling storylines before this week's championship, the stage is perfectly set.
"The championship is all set to go," said Royal and Ancient Golf Club chief executive Peter Dawson. "We have a terrific field and the course, I think, is set up to find a worthy champion.
"We've received, by and large, very strong support from a vast majority of players I've spoken to about the condition of the course and its set-up.
"I'm very confident that this course will throw up the top players of the world again competing on Sunday afternoon."
The 134th British Open is scheduled to start at 0530 GMT, when Britain's Simon Dyson will strike the first tee shot.
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