Oakmont Country Club, venue for this week's US Open, is regarded as one of the toughest golf courses in the world. If professionals struggle, how does an 8-handicapper tackle it? We sent Finlay Hutchison to find out...

What happens when an 8-handicapper plays perhaps the world's hardest golf course? 

After a difficult round in 2007, Tiger Woods famously said: "A 10-handicapper wouldn't break 100 round here." Ernie Els, who won the first of his two US Opens at Oakmont in 1994, added: "My dad's a good 11-handicapper and he wouldn't break 105 on a US Open course."

Ahead of the 2016 event, Sky Sports was lucky enough to play this golfing behemoth on the outskirts of Pittsburgh, a week before the tournament's start date, and it wasn't pretty.

On the surface, there is nothing about Oakmont Country Club that appears too difficult. There are no trees, there are no water hazards, the wind never gets too strong and it certainly isn't the world's longest course. 

So what makes Oakmont famously tough? 

Angel Cabrera was five over par here when he held off Woods and Jim Furyk to land his maiden major in 2007, a week when the field managed to break par only eight times between them over the four days' play. 

First impressions reveal that accuracy off the tee is crucial. The US Open is famed for penalising errant shots and with fairways often cut just 20 yards wide, the punishments for not being super-straight are severe.

If fairways are found, approach shots are never too treacherous. With anything from 100 to 175 yards in on most occasions, Oakmont temporarily takes away the torture and provides some relief. However, as soon as one goes wayward, the course reveals its sadistic other half. 

Speaking to USGA executive director Mike Davis, one of my playing partners compared the US Open figurehead to chief James Bond nemesis Blofeld. But does he really watch the action, stroking his favourite pet with pleasure as players hack out of rough as thick as a bog brush, four-putting their way to double-bogey and beyond?

Davis's response to this is characteristically dry: "Fans have come to expect to see, one week a year, the players tested. We're going to test your accuracy, ability to recover, distance control and scrambling on the greens. If you're accurate you'll get rewarded."

On a personal note, the middle cut of rough is impenetrable with anything lower than an 8 iron and the deep rough will have you attending the famous church pew bunkers with more on your agenda than just a hack back to the fairway.

Elsewhere, Oakmont's other defence is its greens. Speaking to the club pro, the greens a week before the tournament were US Open speed at 14.5 on the stimpmeter - a contraption, unsurprisingly, conceived at this very course. 

The majority of them are at best upturned saucers. Rick, a wisened caddie of 45 years on this hallowed turf, said: "If you can't hit with spin you won't stay on the green." And he wasn't wrong - sorry again Rick.

When they are eventually found, the often-used expression "like putting on glass" rings especially true. A framed saying in the clubhouse notes: "Oakmont is the only course where you think about your second putt before you've hit your first."

Personally speaking, putting is usually the scorecard's saviour with trusty 'Nubbins' in the bag - the best £10 ever spent on ebay or anywhere else for that matter. Sadly this didn't prove to be the case during the round and a desperate scramble to two or even three-putt became the depressing norm.

So how did I get on over 18 holes? Playing pretty well, six pars were wrenched from the course largely due to accuracy off the tee. However, on holes that weren't parred, Oakmont dished out the punishment and I finished with a 99 that didn't include putts inside three feet. You be the judge come Sunday.

As another of my playing partners put it to me on the third tee: 'I've just played two of the best holes of my life and I've come away with two eights."

As a result, a popular topic for discussion is would you like to be a member of such a brute? Speaking to some of the locals, they can't wait to see how the pro's fare later this week.

They too want to see some big numbers as there is certainly kudos in being a member of, or having played, the world's hardest golf course.