ROCKVILLE, Mary. – The final qualification for the US Open is a test of pain tolerance.
It should destroy your senses, providing body blow after body blow, numbing you to your last nerve.
Nickname “a very long day of golf“It does not come easily to those who are tasked with enduring it.” Thirty-six holes, usually in heat, too a lot usually with a field full of competitors looking to gut you: These are the stakes that anchor thousands of US Open hopefuls to the final 43 spots in the 156-player field.
That’s right again the poles that annually provide some of the best stories in golf – the stories of the underdogs and the new stars; of first hats and old hats; absentees and some who struggle with a careless scorecard.
These are the stories that make me love golf. And on Monday at Woodmont Country Club in Rockville, Maryland, it’s news I’m chasing closely, taking my first final day of qualifying for the US Open as soon as possible.
Below are some of the best stories I’ve seen, heard and experienced.
1. Ben Kohles Race
It wasn’t hard to imagine he was Ben Kohles after the sun went down Monday at Woodmont Country Club. You could literally see him getting tired.
In golf’s longest day, Kohles was a golfer who had golf the longest of all day. Not by the letter of the law – that honor will belong to Andrew Putnam and Spencer Tibbitts, who played six playoff holes on Monday evening before darkness fell at the end of their match on Tuesday morning. But certainly in his character frequent flyer miles.
Kohles won the BMW Charity Pro-Am of the Korn Ferry Tour on Sunday evening in Greenville, S.C. He jumped in the car shortly after his trophy photos and caught his flight from Charlotte to DC.
I caught him close to scoring shortly after he received his medal and invitation from the USGA, the joy still visible on his face.
“I feel like my head is still spinning,” he said. “The craziest 24 hours of my golf life.”
He wandered into the evening not long after sharing a mile-wide grin with his family on FaceTime. It was only 8 o’clock at night, but it was time to sleep.
2. Logan Reilly’s all-time week
Six days ago, Logan Reilly ended his Auburn Tigers’ 2026 season with a birdie putt on the 18th hole to win the NCAA title. On Monday, he ended his bid to qualify for the US Open with a final round to earn a spot in his first major tournament at Shinnecock Hills.
“Yeah, the best week of my life,” Reilly said Monday evening.
And he may not be exaggerating. Reilly’s family has roots on Long Island, and he attended the 2018 US Open at Shinnecock as a fan. Many of his father’s friends have already been waiting a week for the 2026 national championship – and now they will have a hometown hero to support.
3. Jake Sollon’s plans changed
The first suggestion that Jake Sollon could be the man to beat in the playoffs at the last qualifying spot in Woodmont came before the game even started. It was on the 18th hole, Sollon’s 36th of the day, that the 28-year-old professional bogeyed the hole with a 50-footer for birdie that would have clinched the spot.
The chances of that putt landing were deceptively small, perhaps less than half a percent, but Sollon seemed you are angry when it does not fall.
“I wanted that one so bad,” Sollon said with a smile afterward. “I was talking to him [fellow pro] Cory Crawford before the circuit, and he did 50 feet in the final a few years ago to qualify. We wanted to repeat that.”
Instead, Sollon bogeyed the 6th hole for a playoff with Lee. Lee went first on the par-3, hitting a safe drive that just fell over the spine of the green and left him about 40 feet for birdie. Solon went second, hitting a putt from 160 yards that landed near the flag and stayed there – a close ace on his first swing.
When Lee’s birdie putt missed, Sollon was eight inches short of a birdie putt.
“I’ve never been that nervous over an eight-inch putt in my life, but it fell,” he said afterward.
“I was supposed to fly to Bogota, Colombia to start the PGA Tour Americas,” he said. “I’ve never been so happy to cancel a flight in my life.”
His tournament victory gave him his first major tournament start, and a trip to Shinnecock to begin preparation for next week.
4. Landon O’Hara’s epic entrance
It wasn’t hard to spot the youngest player on the field at Maryland’s final playoff stop. Sixteen-year-old Landon O’Hara looked like he’d stumbled out of high school and into the gym. And as it turned out, he had.
O’Hara is a great host the second student in high school. This was his first shot at a final. He succeeded of the area they qualify after the headlines of this US Open season. As O’Hara’s father said, his son’s cycle ended early in the morning – so early Landon decided to go home for a few hours. A typical high school day followed, including a few hours of studying for her AP exams, before O’Hara got the call: her grade point average was holding up as one of the day’s best, and it was time to get back to studying for the playoffs.
Seven hours after the end of his first round, O’Hara returned to qualifying for a one-hole playoff, which he won, earning him a spot in the final.
He failed to qualify for the US Open on Monday at Woodmont, but the experience will no doubt serve him well in the years to come (and maybe in those trials, too!).
