Tuesday, August 01, 2006

Weekly notes from the PGA Tour

E NOTES FROM THE PGA TOUR

PGA TOUR·

The veteran set played well last week at the U.S. Bank Championshipin Milwaukee with five players over age 40 finishing in the Top 10.

In addition to winner Corey Pavin (age 46), Jeff Sluman (48), Joey Sindelar(48), Woody Austin (42) and Billy Andrade (42) all finished in the Top 10.·

Corey Pavin won last week’s U.S. Bank Championship while finishing dead last in Driving Distance for the week.·

Vijay Singh enters this week’s Buick Open looking for his thirdconsecutive win at the event. Singh also won the title at Warwick Hills in1997 giving him three wins in the last nine years at the tournament.·

A Tiger Woods victory at the Buick Open would give him 50 career TOUR wins. He’d be just the seventh player in history to reach that figure.He’d also be the youngest. Jack Nicklaus was 33 years, 6 months and 21 days old when he claimed his 50th career title (1973 PGA Championship). Woods turned 30 last December 30.·

If the season were to end today, THE TOUR Championship presented byCoca-Cola would feature a field that included 14 Americans, five playersfrom Australia, four from South Africa, two from Canada and one each fromFiji, Sweden, England, Spain and Colombia.·

Trevor Immelman and Nathan Green lead all rookies with five Top-10 finishes each. The two are among four rookies to already pass the$1-million mark in season earnings. The others are Camilo Villegas and J.B. Holmes

One more on rookies: The top three players in Driving Distance onTOUR are rookies—Bubba Watson, J.B. Holmes and Robert Garrigus. In fact, seven players ranked among the Top 10 in Driving Distance are in theirfirst year on TOUR.

NATIONWIDE TOUR·

The Nationwide Tour Championship at the Houstonian announced a purseincrease this week. The season-ending event will now offer a $750,000purse with $135,000 going to the winner.·

Does anyone close like Brandt Snedeker? On his final hole inregulation in his last five starts, Snedeker has recorded four eagles andone birdie.·

One more on Snedeker: Over his last five starts, the former U.S. Public Links champ has jumped from 93rd on the money list to seventh.·

Tripp Isenhour enters this week’s Cox Classic presented by Chevroletwith two wins on the season. One more and he earns an automatic promotionto the PGA TOUR. Of the seven players to earn the automatic promotion inTour history, three have done so in Omaha—Chris Smith, Heath Slocum and Jason Gore. Gore accomplished the feat last year.

CHAMPIONS TOUR·

Following his victory last week at the Senior British Open, LorenRoberts has won five of his 20 career starts on the Champions Tour. He has18 Top 10 finishes in those 20 starts. He’s played in the final group onSunday eight times already this year, winning four times. By the way, hedidn’t earn his fifth PGA TOUR win until his 432nd career start.·

Roberts and Jay Haas are the only players to finish in the Top 10 ineach of four Champions Tour major championships held so far in 2006.·

One more on Roberts: His final-round score of 75 equals thesecond-highest final round score by a winner in Tour history. Only thefinal-round 76 by Lee Elder at the 1985 Denver Post Champions was higher.·

70-year old Gary Player posted a 1-under par 69 in the first round oflast week’s Senior British Open.

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