British Open: Augusta Bounce Can Keep the Smile on Mickelson's Face

The oldest canard in the book is the one about how getting the first big win is the hardest bit, and after that they just fall into your lap like autumn leaves. We can all think of plenty of one-time winners, in practically every individual sport, who never translated that opening success into a string of victories. But Phil Mickelson is expected to be the one who proves the rule.

This year's US Masters was the 47th major tournament of Mickelson's career. When he arrived at Augusta National he could count $20m (£11m) in winnings from 12 years on the US tour, with 21 tournament victories to his name. But no major. His triumph on that sultry afternoon last April, after perhaps the most tumultuous and enthralling final round in the history of the Masters, took the monkey off his back in a big way.

Mickelson's victory at Augusta was the result of unusually careful preparation. He arrived a couple of weeks early and dedicated himself to a renewed study of the course. At Shinnecock Hills last month he adopted the same approach and was rewarded with second place behind Retief Goosen on a hard and fast course that made the US Open resemble a links tournament. And now he has taken the time to reacquaint himself with Royal Troon, where in 1997 he finished in a tie for 24th place, 12 strokes behind Justin Leonard.

He arrived last week and played a round on Wednesday before heading over to Loch Lomond for the first round of the Scottish Open. After missing the cut on Friday, he returned to Troon for a further round that evening. He took the weekend off, sleeping late, before returning to the Open course for further work on the practice ground with Dave Pelz, a former Nasa scientist who now specialises in coaching the short game.

But it was his career-long coach, Rick Smith, who made the most significant change to Mickelson's game earlier this year. Starting in the first week of January, Smith encouraged the left-hander to develop a controlled fade off the tees, thus putting himself on the same line as the majority of the right-handers. Mickelson also started to fire the ball on a lower trajectory, which removed some of the flamboyant aggression from his game but made him a tougher competitor almost overnight.

Mickelson's smile as he made his way around the back nine on the last day at Augusta will never be forgotten by those who saw it, and the reward for his first major has been more than merely financial and statistical. Not surprisingly, it has made him a more confident and relaxed player.

"I hope it has," he said yesterday. "What's been nice for me is that at each major in the past I would try different things leading in, in an effort to break through. And now I feel I have much better direction on how to prepare for a tournament, so that when I get to the big tournaments I feel much more confident in the shots that I need to hit, as well as where to hit it. I don't know if I'll ever be more confident on a golf course than I am at Augusta, after 12 years of playing there and knowing which way the putts break, but I guess I'm as curious as anybody to see how I execute some of the new shots that I feel I've discovered and how the outcome is here at Troon."

Augusta, he said, puts the emphasis on length. At the US Open, the priority is accuracy off the tee. "This [Troon] emphasises trajectory and spin control. It's firmer and it takes getting used to. I've enjoyed the opportunity to come here and try to learn where balls roll and end up. It's something that I probably should have done in the past but didn't really know how to prepare the best for, and I think I'm a little more prepared for it this week."

That tied 24th place seven years ago was actually Mickelson's second best performance in an Open championship, behind his tied 11th at St Andrews in 2000. In the past two years he has not even made the top 50 finishers. It may be that the 34-year-old Californian's game, honed in the lush environment of US target golf, will never be suited to the requirements of links golf, which put a premium on the ability to improvise. But it would be nice, some time between tomorrow morning and Sunday night, to see that smile light up the Ayrshire coast.