Green Reading

Brunswick Co. junior gets good draw

Dalton Gore of The First Tee of Brunswick County caught a good draw in the Wal-Mart First Tee Open. Gore has been paired with Jay Haas in the $2.1 million Champions Tour event being played Friday through Sunday on Pebble Beach Golf Links and Del Monte Golf Course. Not only is Haas from Greenville and a really nice guy, he's a player that has a chance to win.
The event pairs 78 First Tee junior golfers with 78 professionals and will be televised on Golf Channel. Gore was chosen as a top performer in a competition for First Tee members throughout the country at Kansas State in July. Walt Stachura of Sunset Beach, N.C., is Gore's coach at The First Tee and will caddy for him in the event.

Course reviews by the masses

Golfers planning to play on Grand Strand courses have another place to look for guidance. Representatives of Myrtle Beach Golf, which is affiliated with the Myrtle Beach National Company that owns and/or operates several Grand Strand courses, announced Wednesday the launch of the “Golf Insider.” It is a consumer-driven, online service that shares the experiences of Myrtle Beach golfers. It is hosted by Myrtle Beach Golf at www.MBN.com, a large online provider of Myrtle Beach tee times, with players from across the U.S., Canada,  England, Germany, Scotland, Ireland and many parts of Asia included. Reviews of area courses by local and visiting golfers through online surveys are included in the forum, so players have an opportunity to read other players’ comments and share their own experiences. Of course I can't guarantee they'll be as unbiased as the monthly course reviews printed in The Sun News. Only golfers who booked tee times at www.MBN.com have access to surveys.
The site also offers course videos, searches for available tee times and rates, the ability to book packages and tee times in real time, maps of area courses, and coupon offers.

LPGA mandates English

The LPGA has given its members a directive that they have to learn English. Shouldn't be much of a problem for the U.S. players, but it might mean some extra work for many of the young Asian, particularly Korean, players on the tour. It's a new strategy for me.  If you can't beat 'em, make 'em speak like you.
In all honesty, it's a mandate that is designed to help the tour's marketability in the U.S., especially as TV contracts and tournament sponsorships are expiring in 2009. Sponsors and people who pay to play in pre-tournament pro-ams want to be able to have at least a casual conversation with the player they're paired with.
I'm sure the young Asian players will try to comply, and they probably want to learn English anyway. But it will be difficult to enforce. Will the LPGA Tour be giving pop quizzes to its players? The tour says it will require players to pass oral English exams once they've been on tour for two years. But do you kick a player off a tour because they can't speak English fluently enough. Should a great golfer who is a slow learner be punished. It's a golf tour, not a university. And for fringe players struggling to cover traveling expenses, are they expected to hire a traveling tutor? It will be interesting to see if the tour follows through with threatened suspensions if any players fail to learn English. It could conceivably set the tour up for a legal battle.

FedEx Cup without Tiger, but with intrigue

At least we don't know who is going to win. The absence of Tiger Woods in the FedEx Cup Playoffs, which began Thursday with the first round of The Barclays, is never good news for the PGA Tour. But it does leave the playoffs with more intrigue. Who will step up and win the second annual Cup? Padraig Harrington has a chance for a monster year after winning two consecutive major championships. Sergio Garcia can break through and somewhat make up for near misses in the last two majors. And Phil Mickelson can resurrect his season with a playoff title. Without Woods, the title is open to a number of players, though Justin Rose doesn't look like he'll be one of them. The Englishman, whose instructor is Nick Bradley of Barefoot Resort, is playing on the European Tour this year rather than the first playoff event. He's the reigning European Tour money list titlist and is apparently serious about defending. Who do I like? I'm taking Mike Weir for sentimental reasons. Weir, a Canadian, is following hockey tradition and growing a playoff beard. He appears in a FedEx Cup Playoffs commercial with hockey legend Wayne Gretzky, who suggested that Weir grow a playoff beard, and Weir has apparently followed through and has a beard.
The playoffs should conclude with a kiss of the Cup for the first time. Woods reserves his kisses for his family and major championship trophies, but this year's winner will surely be ecstatic enough to kiss the cup, if not the pile of money that will be at his disposal. Unlike last year, when the entire $10 million was deferred, $9 of the $10 million will be in a pile awaiting the winner.

New club regulations will be rough, mainly for pros

Hitting the fairway off the tee is about to take on more importance. The United States Golf Association and Royal & Ancient Golf Club announced revisions to the Rules of Golf, placing new restrictions on the size and edge sharpness of golf club grooves on clubs with lofts equal to or greater than 25 degrees (generally a standard 5-iron and above). The revisions are designed to restore the challenge of playing shots to the green from the rough by reducing backspin on those shots. The initial focus of the new rules will be highly skilled professional golfers and USGA executives expect it will have little impact on the play of most golfers.
The rules apply to clubs manufactured in 2010 and beyond, the same year that the USGA will enforce the new regulations at the U.S. Open, U.S. Women's Open and U.S. Senior Open and each of their qualifying events. All USGA amateur championships will apply the new regulations beginning in 2014. Large U grooves with sharp edges, a component of many contemporary clubs, will be outlawed and smaller V grooves with rounder edges will be allowed, though a V shape isn't required. Clubs manufactured prior to Jan. 1, 2010 that conform to current regulations will continue to be considered conforming to the USGA Rules of Golf until at least 2024, including clubs purchased after that date from manufacturers' existing model ranges. So those clubs can still be used to establish and maintain a USGA Handicap Index.

Wyndham reaching for relevance

This past week's Wyndham Championship at Sedgefield Country Club in Greensboro, N.C. _ formerly the Greater Greensboro Open _ has been floundering for years in its attempts to attract a top field and, to a lesser degree, significant crowds. A group from Greensboro that I ran into at the Verizon Heritage in Hilton Head Island a few years ago summed it up when they said they'd rather drive to Hilton Head because of the setting, atmosphere and competition than attend the GGO in their backyard.
The tournament overcame one issue this year, when it sold out over the weekend for the first time in at least 58 years. During the 1950 GGO, tournament organizers ran out of tickets but printed more, so a sellout is debatable. This year 25,000 tickets were allotted daily, including all hospitality passes, weekly badges and general-admission tickets. The fact that Sweden native Carl Pettersson, a Raleigh, N.C., resident who spent part of his childhood in Greensboro and attended N.C. State, contended and eventually won probably helped the local cause. But the fact that Pettersson outlasted runner-up Scott McCarron, who hasn't finished inside the top 50 on the PGA Tour Money list in six years, is symptomatic of the tournament's larger issue. There weren't a lot of stars entered in the event, and there aren't likely to be many in coming years. The moved to Sedgefield this year from Forest Oaks won't do much considering this year's birdie-fest _ amateur Danny Lee shot no worse than a 68 _ and the position of the tournament between the PGA Championship and first FedEx Cup Playoff event makes it attractive to none of the PGA Tour's stars and a limited number who are already in the top 170 in FedEx Cup points. The old GGO still has its work cut out for it in the future.

Cut finger forces Johnson WD

A cut on a finger is the reason given for PGA Tour rookie and Myrtle Beach resident Dustin Johnson's withdrawal from this week's Wyndham Championship in Greensboro, N.C., after shooting a 73 in the first round. Johnson is still eligible for the first FedEx Cup playoff event, the $7 million Barclays in New Jersey, this upcoming week but may need to make the cut in order to continue in the playoffs. Johnson entered the Wyndham 111th on tour in FedEx Cup points and the top 120 advance to the Deutsche Bank Championship in Boston from Aug. 29-Sept. 1. It's not clear if the cut will keep Johnson sidelined longer than this week.

McPherson on a roll

Kristy McPherson of Conway is tied for 56th after shooting a 1-over-par 73 today in the opening round of the CN Canadian Womens Open in Ottawa, and based on her recent play that should improve. In her second season, McPherson entered the event as one of the hottest players on the LPGA Tour. She had three consecutive top-seven finishes prior to the Ricoh Women
s British Open, and closed that event with a 7-under 65 with five birdies and an eagle to tie for 21st.
McPherson said of the experience playing her first British Open: ``The whole week was up and down, kind of like this weather, you know.  The first day was really good golf, and not too many mistakes, and same as [Sunday], and I'm the same person that played the last two days. Got a little bit of the British Open style weather and the crowds here are unbelievable, but my first British Open, I loved it.  It was great.''

Baggage becoming weighty issue

The new and still evolving policy of many airlines to charge passengers for checked baggage could give the Grand Strand another obstacle to overcome in attempts to attract visiting golfers. Some airlines charge for the first bag checked, others for the second and subsequent bags, and the costs can be exhorbitant. In a trip in July to visit family and friends in Maine, I chose not to pay the $50 it was going to cost me to bring my golf clubs and instead borrowed a freind's clubs for a pair of nine-hole rounds.
If courses take a look to the present and near future, they may want to start adding to their inventory of rental clubs. It will allow them to be prepared for the possible increase in requests and provide a new means of revenue.

Pine Lakes readied for return

I learned some more information on the opening of Pine Lakes International Country Club In a recent conversation with Mike Buccerone, senior director of clubs and amenities for both Grande Dunes and Pine Lakes. It appears Burroughs & Chapin Co. intends to place the venerable course that is being refurbished and slightly redesigned by architect Craig Schreiner in Tier 3 (near the top) of a four-tier Grand Strand pricing system. The course is also expected to reopen on or near March 12, the date high spring rate season kicks in.