10 under

19 year old Minea Blomqvist of Finland shot the lowest round ever in a women's major: 10 under, 62 at the British Open. Incredible. To make 62, Minea sunk a 60 footer on the last hole! It was her second 62 in 3 weeks.

The course must have been playing somewhat easy by the scores, including Christie Kerr's 9 under, 63.

buick open

Wow! Here's the leaderboard at the Buick Open:

Vijay Singh -18
John Daly -16
Tiger Woods -15
Carlos Franco -15.

Need we say more? Don't miss the final round on Sunday.

Martha Burk gets settlement of $120,000

Not every likes Martha Burk, but, in our country, she has a right to free speech. The Eleventh Circuit found the City of Augusta violated her right by trying to prevent her protest of Augusta National. Now, the City of Augusta has settled the lawsuit for $120,000 to pay Burk's attorney costs. This is a victory for speech, and golf.

McGwire Misses the Cut...

For those sports fans out there, Mark McGwire received a special invitation to play in The Western Amateur, which is one of the largest/best amateur golf tournaments in the country.  Unfortunately for Mark, he did not make the cut after shooting rounds of 82-76.

Duke to-be Junior Nate Smith from California is leading at 6-under 134.

For results click here.

I'd like to give props to the Division III National Champion Chad Poling, who made the cut at -1 139.  Chad played at Ohio Wesleyan University, where I graduated from in 2002.  He's a class act, and it is really great to see him succeed like he has.

Good luck Chad!!

tiger and yahoo!

Speaking of adventure, Tiger struck a deal with Yahoo! Sports to provide exclusive postings.  Seems fitting because Yahoo runs a fantasy golf league sponsored by Buick, one of Tiger's endorsements.

One of our readers said he plays fantasy golf (and won with Carlos Franco's win last Sunday).  Is fantasy golf any fun? 

Adventure Golf Anyone?

"Andre Tolme has just finished a round of golf with an eagle on the 18th hole. But his score was 506 [for the hole]." reads a article from ESPN.com.  Andre's golf course was the country of Mongolia which was over 1,234 miles long, which he estimated to have a par of 11,880. He apparently played the course a total of 290 over par -- and 509 lost balls. 

Sounds like a pretty interesting story and he plans on writing a book on his adventure!!

Titleist Rules the US Junior

I read on PGATour.com that "A Titleist ball was used by 153 out of the 156 players at the U.S. Junior Amateur Championship last week."

That is Ridiculous!!

Personally, I've played Titleist my entire life.  Don't exactly know why, but I've tried other balls and Titleist has always had the "Tiffany's" of golf ball. 

Currently it is the ProV1 or ProV1x. 

I'm currently playing the ProV1x, because I hit it about 8 yards further off the tee and I don't spin the snot out of it.  However, I'm slowly working through trying all of the "upper-tier" golf balls available, so that might change.

Any ideas on others I should try?

----

As recommended by Maverick...  I'm including a bit of explanation as to how I know I picked up about 8 yards off the tee.

To start. I'm a solid 3 handicap and played 4 years of college golf, so I'm not just your everyday weekend golfer.

I've been playing golf since I was 8 yrs old, and I'm currently 23.This spring, I decided that I wanted to try the new drivers out on the market. I was playing with a Ping ISI with 7.5 degrees of loft and a UST Profroce 65 gram stiff shaft and hit it 245 or so carry off the tee. So, I started playing around with new drivers. The owner at Oakhaven golf club in Delaware, Ohio gave me a Titleist 983K with the Adilia NV x-65 shaft in it to try. Well I started to hit the ball much higher and carry it further, approximately 10 yards.

I had heard the pros say that the proV1x spun less off the driver for those with higher swing speeds. So, I thought I'd give it a try. I had a dozen Slazenger Players balls that I got from a broker at Merrill Lynch and I also picked up a sleeve of ProV1x's from the pro shop. I was amazed with the difference in ball flight. The Players ball would go out and just flutter out of the air, while the ProV1x would go out and then turn over and run. So not only was I carrying the ball nearly 8-10 yards further with the ProV1x, but when the ball hit the ground, it ran like it stole something.

I was a true skeptic about buying yards or the newest technology, but ask anyone I play with and they'll agree that a small $500 investment in my golf game, matching the ball and club has added at least 20 yards off the tee.
 

tiger: still ahead of Jack's pace

Expressing confidence, Tiger said that he's still ahead of Jack's pace in winning majors.   Tiger is 28 and has won 8 majors, although has gone 9 majors without winning one.  Jack didn't win his 8th major until age 30, and had gone 11 winless majors.  Good point.

juniors

15-yea- old Sihwan Kim of Korea won the U.S. Junior Amateur at the famed Olympic Club in San Francisco.  He defeated David Chung in match play, 1 up.  Tiger still has the record for being the youngest winner of the event -- he was 22 days younger than Kim when he won.   Of course, Michelle Wie is still younger than Kim.  Now that's youth.

carlos franco: who needs practice?

Carlos Franco won the U.S. Bank tournament on Sunday.  The Paraguayan golfer is known as the "anti-Vijay," not because he doesn't like Vijay, but because he never hits balls on the range -- ever.  He just shows up to the golf course and fires away.  Unbelievable.

On a related note,  I played 9 holes for the first time in 3 weeks,  a layoff due in part to a recurring shoulder injury, which I hope not to aggravate.  The Carlos Franco method worked for the first 2 holes.  I parred the first, and then, after duck hooking my drive on the 2nd, hit one of the most amazing 3-irons from 210 yards out and in a squirrely lie in the rough.  The ball ended up 15 feet from the hole.  I left the birdie putt short, but was even after 2.  My game went south, though, from all the rust.  The steady drizzle didn't help, either.  But, unlike Carlos Franco, I'm the kind of golfer who loves the range.  So not hitting for 3 weeks definitely hurt.

annika 2.0

Well, we may have jinxed her.  Annika shot an uncharacteristic 71 (with 5 bogeys and 5 pars) on Sunday in France.   Wendy Doolan tracked her down, shooting 3 birdies and 2 eagles within 5 consecutive holes.  She beat Annika by 1 shot.  Michelle Wie shot a respectable 69 to recover from her poor round yesterday, but finished well back. 

annika

Annika's pulled into the lead at the Evian Masters.  (I'm sure they have really good water there!)  You have to marvel at what Annika's doing on the women's tour.  She's usually near the lead at every tournament.  Remind anyone of Tiger 2000?  But what's different about Annika is that she is so quiet and pleasant in her domination, nothing flashy.

BTW, Michelle Wie had a bad round, +4, largely because of a balky (Scotty Cameron) putter.  But when you're only 14, that's OK.

michelle wie

Michelle Wie has switched to the Nike driver.  Here are great pics (look at Michelle's coil in the last pic!) from the Evian Masters, where she is -2 after 2 rounds, with the leader Karen Stupples at -10 and Annika and Laura Davies at -9.  Full leaderboard here.

Grace Park hits the Nike driver as well, and she hits it well.  I haven't seen Michelle enough to evaluate her drives in this tournament, but will try to catch her drives this weekend.  Maybe the switch will be good.  We'll see.

.95

All that Ernie Els needs in points to overtake Tiger in the World Rankings.  It almost seems inevitable, the way things are going this year.

new technology...for tees?

I just saw this advertised on The Golf Channel:  the "brush tee."  I've never tried it, but it sounds like a good idea.  The theory is that soft bristles will impede the club less than a wooden tee.  But, when the club head is traveling at speeds over 100 mph, I'm not sure this will make a difference.  If you hit the ball correctly, the club face will make contact with the ball first (and not the tee).  By the time the club head hits the tee, the ball should be gone.  Anyone try this yet?

UPDATE:  Here's one favorable review from a Golf Blogger.  Anyone else?

word from tiger

Tiger says he thought he should have won the British, at least on his website.  Maybe this is a misquote.  If not, who is he kidding?

UPDATE:  The New York Times ran a good article with the answer.

todd hamilton, ryder cup?

He's just won the British and won the Honda Classic earlier this year.  He's moved into 15th place on the Ryder Cup standings (top 10 plus 2 captain's picks go).  If Todd Hamilton doesn't crack the top 10, should Hal Sutton pick him as a captain's pick?  Or maybe the question really is:  how could you pass over one of this year's major winners for the Ryder Cup, one who stared down Ernie Els?

high tech golf?

Ernie Els and Tiger Woods are reported today of saying they are in favor of imposing some limits on the new drivers and golf balls.  Jack Nicklaus has been saying this, too.  But you've got to wonder whether Els's and Woods's comments are not fueled in part by the growing competition out there. 

major drama

What more could you ask for?  This year, we've had 3 engrossing major tournaments.  Yesterday's final round of the British Open was golf at its best.  Phil Mickelson made a mini-run, but may have made a tactical mistake in playing it safe (but who could blame him after he's suffered so much grief for not playing it safe).  Ernie Els made a major run, almost birdieing the last 3 holes.  His par on the 14th from off the middle of the gourse tree was one of the most incredible pars ever!  (Ironically, Dave Pelz had a clip the night before on the Golf Channel, showing how to hit that shot.) 
 
And then there's 38 year-old Todd Hamilton, a journeyman with much game who beat Ernie Els in a playoff.  Todd calls his style of play "ugly golf."  But there was nothing ugly about his play on Sunday.  It may be time for everyone to buy a utility rescue club, as Todd Hamilton showed it's a really good chipper (which I thought was illegal at one point). 
 
The Open also had another memorable feature:  Nick Faldo's commentary.  That guy is hilarious.  And he was right about the playoff, contrary to Ian Baker Finch's strong sentiments:  Ernie did not have a "huge advantage."  If anything, I thought Ernie had much more pressure on him as the favorite.  Todd Hamilton had nothing to lose and everything to gain.  Faldo was right.   ABC should hire that guy.

Four (of many) reasons I love the British Open

1.  Holes with great nicknames like the Postage Stamp.
2.  It is a bad thing -- as it should be -- to have your ball go into a bunker.
3.  No waiting all day for the leaders to tee off: wake up, turn on the TV, action.
4.  Cheeky announcers with great accents to go along with great comments.

What a leaderboard!

The British Open has quite a guady leaderboard going into Sunday's final round, and I hope it stays tight throughout the day.   I hope the four players who can make a legit argument as the world's number 1 right now -- Els, Goosen, Mickelson and Woods -- all battle to the wire.  Indeed, since the British Open has the coolest playoff format, I am rooting for a four-way tie after 18 holes in order to see this group playing together in an all-star mega-playoff foursome.

walrus and baby walrus

Craig Stadler is defending his B.C. Open title and is four back, at -8, with Jonathan Byrd in the lead at -12.  Baby walrus, Kevin Stadler, is beating his dad, at -9.  Well, if you haven't voted in our latest poll (see below), maybe now is the time!

tiger and tiger Jr.

Saturday will have one very intriguing pairing:  Tiger Woods and Adam Scott.  Tiger had already been paired with Greg Norman, who has been quite vocal in saying that Adam has a better swing than Tiger.  Now, it's Adam Scott himself, the star pupil of Butch Harmon.  You know the motivation level will be there for both guys.  I wonder if Butch will be following the group?

don't skip phil

The rounds of the day -- which was quite windy -- were shot by Skip Kendall and Phil Mickelson at 66.  Skip is leading the British at -7, while Phil resurrected his chances by pulling up to -3.  For a full leaderboard, visit here.   Vijay, Ernie, and Retief are very close, with Tiger lurking. 

lookout for levet

Thomas Levet (France) and Paul Casey (England) sit atop the leaderboard at -5 after the first round of the British at Royal Troon.  If you've forgotten, Levet is the same guy who lost in a playoff to Ernie Els in 2002 at Muirfield.  He's been having an unspectacular year, until he won recently to qualify for the British.  Could this be the year for France?  Might finally put to rest the Jean Claude Van deVelde debacle at Carnoustie.

british open

So the controversy over the conditions at Shinnecock Hills at the U.S. Open raises a good question: what major tournament has the best approach to running the golf tournament?

The British Open is played on links courses, where the natural lie of the land, pot bunkers, and the elements (wind and rain) are pretty much the story.

The U.S. Open is played on different courses, but they all tend to have very slick greens and, at least in the past, high rough.

The PGA is played on different courses, with greens and roughs that are usually more forgiving than the U.S. Open, making the winning score much lower.

And the Masters, of course, is played at Augusta, where the greens are slick, but rough not as penal as the U.S. Open.

Some would claim that the British has the best approach, since it relies the most on the natural elements and the golf course is all in front of you. Personally, I like the Masters, which I think more fairly rewards exceptional play on a more consistent basis than the U.S. Open and British Open. The PGA is a fun tournament, usually with lower scores, but I think it is lacking a little in difficulty. On the other hand, maybe having a variety of approaches to the majors is good for golf?

david duval, WD

David Duval withdrew from the British, citing a back spasm. We wish him well.

david duval

David Duval has decided to play the British Open. I hope he breaks 80, for his sake and ours.

ernie els

He's a 2-time U.S. Open Champion, but Ernie's still steaming mad over his 80 on the last day of the U.S. Open at Shinnecock. He blames it on the USGA for tricking up the course.

Tom Meeks, USGA official, said, "I think a lot of golfers lost their patience and gave up early in the round. I really think Ernie Els gave up after the first hole."

This made Els -- normally, The Big Easy -- go absolutely ballistic. "How do you give up?" Els said. "That is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard in my life. I've never given up on any round of golf in my life. If I did give up, I would have shot 100. You know what? They have got no idea. They've lost the plot in the story. To take one of the best golf courses in this entire world and to make it a farce like that, they've got egg on their face."

Whether or not this is just whining, I think Ernie will be fired up to play Royal Troon.

hank haney, what drives you?

Hank Haney is rated the No. 5 Top Instructor and is reportedly giving advice to Tiger Woods. Lo and behold, Hank adorns the cover of Golf Digest this month, with the title: "The Real Reason You're Missing Fairways."

So you think Haney will give you some great advice about driving. Think again. The article chronicles Hank Haney's own personal "driving yips," when he couldn't for 20 years hit his driver anywhere close to the fairway. It got so bad Haney avoided playing rounds and teaching clinics where he had to hit the driver. As Haney explained, "In 18 years, I played fewer than 10 rounds. I had the driver yips."

Wow, that sounds pretty bad. After years of struggle, Haney's come up with a very different solution, adopting am unorthodox grip with the club in the middle of his palm and an unorthodox swing. The pictures of his driver swing are, quite frankly, a little bit hard to follow and a little bit freaky.

After reading the article, which was written by Haney himself, I had two reactions. First, I thought Mr. Haney was very brave to share what must be a frustrating, if not embarrassing, ordeal he's suffered with his own game. He should be commended for that.

But then my next reaction was: is Tiger getting instruction for his driving woes from this guy? Mr. Haney may very well deserve his No. 5 Top Instructor ranking, but I guess I would be a little bit nervous of trying to fix my driving problems with someone who's got serious driving problems himself. Sure, one might ask, Who better to teach about driving problems than someone who's experienced it himself? The only problem is that Haney's solution for his own woes was to change to something dramatically different -- and downright unorthodox. To take an example, it might be great to get lessons from Seve Ballesteros on the short game, but who in their right mind would go to Seve for how to drive the ball?

new poll

1. The Results from our last poll were pretty overwhelming. Who should coach Tiger?

61.2 % Butch Harmon
11.9 Tiger himself
9 Someone else
3% each for David Leadbetter, Rick Smith, and Mark O'Meara

2. Now, vote in our new poll. What's the best father-son combo of golfers all-time?

Kevin Stadler is making a big campaign for the honors, having won today his 2nd Nationwide Tour tournament in the last 3 events. But you make the call. Vote below.

thanks to our readers

On this quiet Sunday, a week before the British Open, we at The Golf Blog would like to thank our readers for making us the No. 1 entry on Google for "golf blog."

We greatly value your readership and will continue to work to provide you with what we hope are enlightening discussions of this great game called golf. Please continue to send us comments!

email from Tiger

I received another email from Tiger. He's gearing up for the British Open at Royal Troon next week. The course is a challenge, and filled with quirky bounces. Comments Tiger, "the most famous hole on the course is the 123-yard par-3 eighth, also known as the Postage Stamp. Never mind that the hole is the shortest in the nine-course British Open rotation, the green is tiny and very difficult to hold. In 1997, I made a triple-bogey six on Sunday, and it ruined any chance I had of contending." That memory would stick in anyone's craw.

Tiger said he's been watching video of the 1997 Open, and working on "everything" to get prepared, particularly low shots. Tiger sounds like he's geared up already for the Open. Says Tiger, "At the moment, I feel very confident about my game. I'm really swinging the club well, and have finished in the Top 10 in four of my last five tournaments. I'm really excited about my new 7.5 Nike Ignite 410cc driver, which I'm hitting longer and straighter. I can't wait to use it again at Troon."

scotty cameron

Scotty Cameron designs putters. A good number of the top pros use his putters, including Tiger, Phil, and Ernie. Scotty Cameron has just come out with two mallet putters -- no doubt influenced by the popularity of bigger putter heads.

I've only putted Scotty Cameron putters at the pro shop. Frankly, the price tag is too steep for my blood. If you use one of his putters, can you tell me what's so great about them? Based on my theory for drivers, there must be something special about the feel of Scotty Cameron putters. Or is just the name?

Leaerboard report?

Rumor had it that 2 of 3 contributors to The Golf Blog played in a tournament yesterday. The other contributor who was stuck slaving away at work is eager for a report. Or was it an ugly day not worthy of discussion?

unorthodox swings

Speaking of Natalie Gulbis, it would be interesting to rank the most unorthodox swings out there. Here are some candidates:

Jim Thorpe
Jim Furyk
Sandy Lyle (post British Open victory)
Arnold Palmer
Natalie Gulbis

I know I'm missing some people, especially from the women's tour. Frankly, compared to the rest, Arnold Palmer may not even fit in this category. Any suggestions?

the LPGA and natalie gulbis

One topic of conversation on the Golf Channel yesterday was 21-year old Natalie Gulbis's calendar. Natalie apparently has decided to model in both swimwear and golf wear for 2004.

If you're wondering, Natalie hasn't won a tournament yet. She has a very unorthodox swing, even more than Jim Furyk's. She is supposed to have a lot of game, and I believe she did well in last year's U.S. Open.

To me, the oddest thing about this calendar is the LPGA's ambivalence to it. The LPGA appears to be promoting it on its website, yet reportedly canceled a signing event with Natalie Gulbis last week. I think the LPGA should just stay out of this business entirely and stick to golf. If Natalie wants to spend her time on a calendar, I guess that's her call.

mark mcgwire

Mark McGwire was on Golf Academy Live tonight. His golf game and swing are very impressive. McGwire will certainly be in the baseball Hall of Fame as soon as he becomes eligible. But it's interesting to imagine what could have been if he chose golf over baseball as a kid.

Since his retirement from baseball, Mark has basically spent his time golfing. He did play as a kid, but eventually became more serious with baseball. Now he has a swing coach and has reduced his handicap to 0. This past year, McGwire was in the Skills Challenge against PGA pros (including Padraig Harrington, Paul Azinger, Peter Jacobsen, Greg Norman, Billy Andrade, Nick Price, and others) and McGwire won! You might think that McGwire is all about the long ball, but what's most impressive is his short game. During the Skills challenge, his short game was better than most of the pros in the competition. As McGwire describes his game, he has really "soft hands."

McGwire's planning on playing in some tournaments. I think he could do really well on the Champions Tour one day (if it's still around when he's 50). He's such a good athlete and could really overpower some of the competition when he's 50. It would even be very interesting if he received a sponsor's exemption to some PGA event today, perhaps the John Deere Classic. Or maybe John Daly and he can play the Pebble Beach AT&T together.

Also impressive: Kelly Tilghman can swing the bat! Mark McGwire took one look at her swing the bat and said "there's nothing he'd change."

Just like Tiger?

Remember that period from 1997 to 1999 between his first Masters win and his first PGA win when Tiger was always in the hunt in majors but would have an ugly double- or triple-bogey to keep him from being in the last few groups on Sunday? That's what I keep thinking about when I see that Michelle Wie is still high on the leader board despitea few ugly late-round doubles. And remember, SHE'S ONLY 14!

Oh, Juli, you are now 8 back of Michelle. The good news is this means you'll almost have your Sunday round finished before Michelle tees off in the fourth-to-last group. Then you, too, can follow the woman most likely to raise the profile of not just women's golf, but all of women's sports.

U.S. Open

After 2 rounds, Jennifer Rosales is leading the pack at -5. Close behind is, of course, Annika Sorenstam at -5.

Here's my favorite: Michelle Wie is -1. Julie Inkster, even. Touche.

news flash: tiger almost misses the cut

Tiger Woods was on the verge of missing the cut, only to birdie 2 of the last 4 holes to pull back to +1. I saw some highlights. Tiger hooked a 2-iron off the tee so far left to the next hole -- even I can do that! Tiger hasn't missed a cut since 1997.

news flash: tiger switches to new driver

Tiger Woods reportedly is using a new graphite driver, with a larger head. He hit 8 or 14 fairways, but admittedly did not play well, shooting -1 under par, 6 shots back of Loren Roberts. I'm assuming that it's still a Nike driver, but it's not clear if the graphite is the head or shaft. For control, I'd recommend going with a medium-sized or smaller titanium head, with graphite shaft. But there's only so much you can do when you're working with a Nike driver...

UPDATE: I saw a clip of Tiger swinging the new driver. To me, it looks like the same old Nike Ignite driver with a graphite shaft. Tiger says he's hitting it longer.

Teenage brigade

Perhaps this is a question for a doctor specializing in adolescent development, but I cannot help but wonder why so many younger female players can complete on the LPGA, but it is the rare male under 25 who can do the same on the PGA. Whatever the explanation, the stories from today's first round of the US Women's Open are fascinating, and particularly the tale of teenager Brittany Lincicome being queen for at least a day.

Oh, Juli Inkster, check out these two links: here's the year-end PGA money leaders for 1995 before Tiger joined the tour when only 9 player made over a $1 million and #50 made roughly $350,000 for the year, and here's the current PGA money leaders through June 2004 which includes 42 players having already earned over $1 million and #50 has already earned more than $850,00.

michelle wie, does she deserve to be in the U.S. Open?

Today, starts the Women's U.S. Open at the beautiful Donald Ross designed Orchards Golf Club. Julie Inkster yesterday complained about the exemption Michelle Wie received to this year's Open.

Well, I've said it before but I'll say it again. Michelle Wie deserved the exemption she received. Had she not been an amateur, she would have qualified in tour winnings she would have earned in the events she played (making the top 28). The only reason she didn't enter a qualifier was that she wanted to play a qualifier for the men's U.S. Public Links Championship to try to qualify for the Masters. Yes, the men's Masters.

Frankly, all the women on the tour -- including Judi Inkster -- should be thankful for all the media attention Michelle Wie brings to the women's tour. She could do for the LPGA what Tiger did for the PGA. As it stands, the LPGA is lagging far behind in purse money, televison viewing, and media following.