Category: PGA

Weather was a factor during round one at the BellSouth Classic today as temperatures hovered below 40 degrees and winds gusted to 40 mph. Play was halted for nearly two hours as freezing rain and snow fell on the course. It was reminiscent of a ski slope with all the beanie caps worn today. Billy Mayfair said, “The hardest part is when it’s cold and you have delays, it’s hard to stay warm.” The delay prevented 63 players from finishing the first round including frontrunner Mayfair.

Billy Mayfair summed up his day by saying, “I made some nice putts.” He started with a 14-foot putt to save par on the second hole and continued with four birdie putts between 10 and 20 feet. He sits at four-under par after 13 holes. He’ll have to get out and finish his round on Sunday morning.

Continue reading “Day Three Brings Round One At the BellSouth Classic”

Last week at The Players Championship, fans wondered if the tournament would ever end. This week, the questions seem to center around whether or not the tournament will ever begin!

Play was once again suspended today before any golfer had a chance to hit a single shot. Play is set to resume Saturday morning at 7am ET. Right now, the schedule is to play 18 holes on Saturday, 18 holes Sunday, and then finish by with 36 holes on Monday. A Monday finish looks to be in the cards again, but this week is much different than last week. The Masters is scheduled to begin next Thursday, and you can bet all participants in The Masters will want to be at their best when the first major of 2005 rolls around.

Continue reading “Rain Rain, Go Away! Still no Shots at the BellSouth”

TPC at Sugarloaf couldn’t take what nature dealt it Thursday as tournament officials cancelled play because rain fell for nine straight hours during the morning and early afternoon. Phil Mickelson said “What a surprise. We’ve had such great weather all year.” The “good weather” Mickelson spoke of could very well delay the tournament further as the forecast is calling for more thunderstorms on Friday. About the only good news is that Saturday’s forecast is clear.

The Players Championship may have finished on a Monday, but a Monday finish for the BellSouth Classic could be deadly: The Masters is next week, and Mickelson and others are certainly going to want to be well-prepared.

Continue reading “Throw Me A Life Ring!”

CEO and veteran PGA Tour caddy Russ Holden describes Caddy For A Cure as “a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for golf enthusiasts to be “inside the ropes” with their favorite Tour player, one-on-one.” What a great idea! You can spend an entire day with a famous Tour pro, help with their club and shot selections, and walk a famous course during an official event! Imagine assisting worthwhile causes while watching the best golfers on tour, up close… and everybody benefits!

Kyle Bugge, recently on the bag for Bernhard Langer (photo at right), had this opportunity. As he wrote recently after a day of caddying for Langer “thank you for giving me the chance to live my dreams.”

Continue reading “Be a PGA Tour Caddy for a Day!”

The 2005 Masters invitations have been sent out, and we know who should be checking their mailboxes. Players qualify for the Masters in one or more of seventeen unique ways. Though technically an “invitation-only” tournament, The Masters has published the criteria it uses for determining who should get an “invitation” for the past 20 or more years.

For example, if you win the Masters you’re welcome to come back and play as long as you’re alive. Winning another major earns you five years of invitations, and winning The Players Championship nets three yearly passes to Augusta. The current US Amateur, the runner-up, the British Amateur, the US PubLinks, and the US Mid-Amateur champion are all invited, along with the top 16, 8, 4, and 4 players from the previous year’s Masters, US Open, British Open, and PGA Championship, respectively. The final spots are reserved for folks who are ranked highly on money lists or Official World Golf Rankings.

Continue reading “2005 Masters Invitations List”

With the first major of 2005 looming, the players coming to the BellSouth Classic are hoping not only to win the golf tournament but also to get one last boost of confidence before The Masters! The top three ranked golfers in the world are not in the field this week, but that does not mean there aren’t any guys in the field that can’t get the job done. Phil Mickelson and Retief Goosen, ranked fourth and fifth in the world respectively, have both won this tournament in the past five years. Mickelson won here in 2000 and Goosen won here in 2002. They’ll be teeing it up come Thursday.

Continue reading “BellSouth Classic Preview”

The Tavistock Cup went 21 holes and ended in a tie. The excitement was palpable as Tiger Woods and Lee Janzen, representing Isleworth, battled in extra holes against South Africans Ernie Els and Retief Goosen of Lake Nona. The 8½ to 8½ tie is the first in the short history of the event and follows Isleworth’s 14½ – 9½ victory at Lake Nona last year.

Tiger Woods earned low medalist honors with a -6 (66) which included two sixes on the front-nine par fives but an incoming 31.

Continue reading “Tavistock Tie”

Now that The Players Championship is finally over, it’s time to move onto another week in the golf world. But this week is somewhat unique, as many of the world’s elite golfers will head to Orlando instead of Atlanta to play in the 2005 Tavistock Cup. This year is special because the world’s second-best player, Tiger Woods, will participate! As a matter of fact, three of the top five players in the world rankings (Woods, Ernie Els, and Retief Goosen) will be playing alongside the best female golfer in the world, Annika Sorenstam.

Continue reading “Tavistock Cup Preview”

The funky weather led to a Funky winner: Fred Funk may have gone backwards in the final round, three-putting three times, but his efforts were good enough to secure a one-stroke victory in the funkiest Players Championship ever.

The former Maryland Terrapin golf coach birdied the par-5 sixteenth, landed his ball safely on the island green at the seventeenth, and got up and down from a greenside bunker – only yards away from the water – on the last hole, holing a five-footer for the save and the victory.

Continue reading “A Funky Monday Finish at The Players Championship”