Road to the US Open

So I was wondering how does the regular amateur qualify for the US Open.  Could someone explain to me how one goes about qualifying.  I'm sure its not as easy as to just sign up for a regional qualifier.  Its always been a goal of mine to just play in a regional qualifier, I'm not counting on ever qualifying for the real thing.  What steps do I need to take in order to get to one of the regional qualifiers.

http://www.usopen.com/en_US/news/qualifying/road_to_the_open.html

Looks like 6 or 7 people qualified for the regionals out of each local qualifier.  I keep clicking on the different locations at random ( http://www.usopen.com/en_US/news/qualifying/index.html ) and looks like at just about any site, a 70 (sometimes higher) would get you through.

Then there are 11 US sectional sites, and the number of qualifiers from each site varies - I presume based on the size of the field.  And these are 36 hole events.  Not sure if you watched, but there was a cool special yesterday on TGC called "The Longest Day" highlighting all of the different stories from each sectional.  The most amazing one, I think, was a kid from Temple who pitched in, after having to take an unplayable, and just ran around screaming and hugging his friends like he was Jim Valvano because he thought he qualified.  Then some "a-hole" ;) decided it would be fun to finish birdie-birdie-birdie-birdie to qualify, thus knocking the college kid out of Merion.  :(

Anyways, good luck on your quest!  I know if I ever get my handicap under 1.4 I will definitely sign up for a qualifier if for no other reason to say I've tried. :)  (I'm pretty sure it's only like $100 for that first round)

I go the regional qualifying whenever it is in SOCal.  Enjoyed a great day yesterday at Newport Beach (we went to the Big Canyon venue, since we had already been to the Newport Beach CC for the Toshiba Classic a year or so ago).  I was a little disappointed that John Cook withdrew.  But it is a great way to see excellent golfers with almost no crowds.  You can get pretty close.  We sat on a bench behind the tenth tee for about three groups and had a great view of their tee shots, since we were about 15 feet behind the players.  And best of all, it's free!

This is not exactly relevant to this thread, but I was just thinking of all the players on the tour that nobody has ever heard of, yet they are making a fairly decent living at it. The one who comes to mind is "Lennie Clements"  a real grinder. To my knowledge he has never won an event let alone a major, yet I believe that he was on the tour for some thirty odd years and often placed in the top ten. (I would have to review his stats to be sure though). He nearly won an open once I think.  I never met Lennie in person, but I think I have been to his home. I used to work with his wife  (Jan) in real estate when they lived in Rancho Bernardo and we may have stopped by the house briefly when the office was on a caravan of new listings.   I have not seen Jan in years since I got out of the business in 1994 but I believe she is still active in La Jolla or maybe Rancho Santa Fe.  He was rarely in the spot light, but was always somebody who could have been in contention. Jan was a real sweet heart and you could not meet a nicer person.

My bad...Lennie and Jan Clements are both selling real estate in Coronado, California. Lennie did win a few events but not on the regular tour. He won one on the Hogan Tour, played in some 470 +/-  made something like 275 cuts.  was in top ten about 29 times according to one stat I read. Career earnings somewhere around 2.5 million. which is not terrible bad since he started his career in 1980 and ended it in 1997. He is also on an Amateur Hall of Fame List.