Green Reading

Sunset Beach's Hecht makes Heavy acquisition at Quail Hollow

Hank Hecht of Sunset Beach, N.C., left Quail Hollow Club with more than memories Thursday following his first visit to the Quail Hollow Championship.

Englishman Greg Owen discovered his putter was damaged just prior to teeing off in the first round and he found a quick replacement. It was a Boccieri Golf Heavy Putter with a long belly-length shaft.
Owen hit 14 of 18 greens, but after attempting 37 putts and shooting a 4-over-par 76 he was ready to lighten his bag of the Heavy Putter and a caddie gave it to Hecht, who was standing near the scoring area.

``Somebody’s caddie came over and said, `How tall are you?’ ’’ Hecht said. ``I said, `Six-foot-3,’ and he said, `Here, perfect. It’s yours.’ I have never tried it before but I’m going to now.’’

He'll likely put it in use at Sandpiper Bay Golf Club, where he and his wife retired seven years ago from Wallkill, N.Y.

 

Quail Hollow Wednesday pro-am has become attraction in itself

The Wednesday Pro-Am at the Quail Hollow Championship has developed into a mini celebrity pro-am. The highlight was two years ago when Tiger Woods played with Michael Jordan, and the galleries following that group was as big as the largest during the actual tournament rounds. This year the pro-am features five celebrities. Participating are NFL quarterback Peyton Manning, basketball legend Julius ``Dr. J'' Erving, NASCAR drivers Michael Waltrip and Jimmy Johnson, and ESPN announcer Chris Berman. It's a quick round and an intimate experience for the amateurs considering there are only two amateurs playing with the PGA Tour pros in each group.

The Quail Hollow Championship is on top of the latest social networking and information sites. For the first year, the Quail Hollow Championship has a Facebook Page (Quail Hollow Championship) and a Twitter account (@QuailHollow). On Facebook, the tournament's site includes videos and photos and has over 500 members, and the Twitter account also has several hundred followers. Both will be updated throughout tournament week with new information.

Dustin Johnson opts to make changes rather than play in Charlotte

Dustin Johnson of Myrtle Beach had the Quail Hollow Championship penciled into his schedule for the first few months of the year, but last week decided to remove his name from the field of committed players and is not among those in a strong field at Quail Hollow Club this week.
According to Johnson's swing coach, Coastal Carolina director of golf Allen Terrell, Johnson isn't satisfied with his game and wants to improve upon it before next week's $9.5 million Players Championship.
Johnson made the decision late last week and informed Terrell on Thursday he was planning to skip the Charlotte event. ``He said, `I'm not happy with my game and I want to spend some time working on it and I want to get ready for The Players,' '' Terrell said.
It's a bit surprising that Johnson would skip the Quail Hollow Championship since he professes to like the course and its one of the three tournaments that his friends and family in Columbia and Myrtle Beach can easily drive to _ the Masters and Verizon Heritage being the other two. But he's apparently serious about making a fairly significant change to his grip that could make him a more consistent player.
Terrell said Johnson has always compensated for a characteristic in his grip that can promote a closed face at impact. ``I think he's tired of working around that and wants to change things,'' Terrell said. ``He's tired of that whole cycle where he has weeks he can't strike the ball like he wants to. I think he wants to get set up better to have a better chance of the club being square at impact.''
Johnson worked on his game late last week with his caddie, Bobby Brown, in town. He attended an outing for TaylorMade at Reynolds Plantation in Georgia on Monday and was expected to be back to the beach Tuesday to continue working on his game some more with Terrell.
Terrell said he thought it would take 30 to 60 days for the grip change to become second nature to Johnson, but Johnson thinks he can expedite the process. ``I shouldn't have challenged him because he said he could do it quicker than that,'' Terrell said. ``If anybody can do it, he can.''

Fire damage minimal, play continues at Myrtle Beach area golf courses

By Alan Blondin
ablondin@thesunnews.com
With 55 golf courses totaling 1,026 holes in Horry County, it would be difficult to find 20,000 contiguous acres without a golf hole on it.
Yet the playing areas of all holes in the county have apparently escaped damage from a wildfire that has burned more than 20,000 acres, destroyed nearly 70 homes and damaged at least 100 more.
``Golf has grown west of the [Intracoastal] Waterway and grown in areas adjacent to where this fire is burning,'' said Bill Golden, president of marketing cooperative Myrtle Beach Golf Holiday. ``When you consider how close it's gotten to the Waterway and U.S. 17, we're very fortunate no courses have sustained serious damage.''
The four courses at Barefoot Resort & Golf _ where dozens of homes were destroyed _ closed Thursday, and two remained closed on Friday. But no other layouts were shut down due to the fire.
Barefoot courses designed by Davis Love III and Tom Fazio sustained infrastructure damage and vegetation around holes burned, according to head pro Mike Ross. They remained closed Friday primarily because wooden bridges over wetlands were burned to the point of being impassable. Courses designed by Pete Dye and Greg Norman reopened Friday.
``We're very fortunate in the respect the golf courses themselves weren't damaged,'' Ross said. ``We had fire right up to the green grass. The golf courses themselves are fine.''
Though the bulk of the Fazio Course will likely remain closed for several days while bridges are repaired, a combination of 19 holes on the Love and Fazio courses will reopen Saturday to give the resort three open layouts in the midst of the busy spring golf season.
Love Course holes 1 through 13, 17 and 18 are being combined with Fazio Course holes 1, 2, 17 and 18 to create the 19-hole course. ``The layout should be fairly easy to maneuver,'' Ross said.
Some of Barefoot's irrigation outlets melted, and an on-course restroom nearly burned. ``It was singed, about as close as you can get without burning down,'' Ross said.
Barefoot workers cleaned areas of the courses and blew and wiped ashes off the clubhouse in the early morning hours Friday before golfers arrived. ``We brought all kinds of staff in to get everything cleaned up and prepared for play,'' Ross said. ``I hope we're out of the woods but I think we'll all believe that a few days down the road.''
Ross said Barefoot staff members called other area courses to find places to play for all golfers with tee times at the closed courses. ``I think every customer we had we were able to service one way or another,'' he said, ``even if it was finding them another course to play.''
The only other course with minor damage reported is the private Members Club at Grande Dunes. Bob Swezey, Executive Vice President of Golf and Resorts for Burroughs & Chapin Co., which owns and operates Grande Dunes, said a berm that acts as a buffer between S.C. 31 and the right side of the first hole and left side of the 11th hole was burned.
He said further damage was prevented by the Grande Dunes maintenance staff along with help from firefighters and construction vendors that supplied water trucks. ``We were blessed,'' Swezey said.
Waterway Hills Golf Club, which is adjacent to the Members Course on its north side, incurred no damage, according to head pro Dick Lesieur. So as the Intracoastal Waterway was closed to boat traffic from U.S. 501 to Little River, golfers were traversing the Waterway in gondolas to play the 27-hole layout.
``We were very lucky that we had not so much as a singed tree here,'' Lesieur said. ``You could see the fire right across Highway 31 from the fourth hole on our Lakes nine, but we had no damage whatsoever.''
Though golfers at Waterway Hills and other layouts including Shaftesbury Glen Golf & Fish Club, which is located off S.C. 90 in Conway, and courses along S.C. 9 in North Myrtle Beach, Longs and Loris, have been playing through some smoke and falling ashes, the fire has done little to slow the area's peak golf season.

Tiger commits to Charlotte event next week

Tiger Woods, winner of the 2007 Quail Hollow Championship and the No.1 ranked player on the Official World Golf Ranking, committed today to play in next week's Quail Hollow Championship. Woods will be making his fourth appearance in the Quail Hollow Championship and will make his first start since winning in 2007. He had to miss the 2008 edition due to knee surgery. Besides his victory in 2007, Woods finished T3 in 2004 and T11 in 2005. This is Woods' first tournament since he tied for sixth at the Masters two weeks ago.
Woods' commitment also means each of the top-four ranked players in the world will compete next week -Woods (No.1), Phil Mickelson (No.2), Sergio Garcia (No.3) and Geoff Ogilvy (No.4). The other players currently ranked among the top 14 in the world who are committed:  Padraig Harrington (No.6), 2005 champion Vijay Singh (No.8), Camilo Villegas (No.10), Robert Karlsson (No.11),  2008 champion Anthony Kim (No.13) and 2006 champion Jim Furyk (No.14).
Also, there are 45 players currently in the field who have won PGA Tour titles in the past two years, including two-time winner Dustin Johnson of Myrtle Beach.

Harbour Town has loyal supporters

Harbour Town Golf Links has a number of devoted players who love the course and return every year for the Verizon Heritage. Jay Haas played for 30 consecutive years before that streak ended in 2007. Lee Janzen has played Harbour Town every year since 1991 with the exception of 1994 when he says he forgot to register.
Players love the Pete Dye layout particularly because it's a shot-maker's course that requires players to shape shots left and right around intruding pines. There are a number of other reasons as well.
`This is a good place,'' said five-time Heritage winner Davis Love III. ``Everybody that comes here, they come here for a reason _ it's a more relaxed tournament, the rounds are faster, the course is easier to walk. There's a lot of great things about this golf course.
``It's a fast-walking, fast-paced, fun course to play. Even though it's hard, it's easy to walk. The fastest course on tour, maybe, especially on the weekends. Guys are flying around early in the mornings.''
Sunday's final round was yet another round with celerity. Most groups played in just over 4 hours.

Impressive streak ends at Heritage, Gay steady

Robert Allenby brought his yacht to Harbour Town Golf Links this week for the Verizon Heritage and had reason to believe he'd make plenty of money to pay the high docking fee this week. He had to figure he'd be around for the weekend and make a check. But he missed Friday's cut by a shot at 3-over 145 to end an impressive streak of 33 consecutive made cuts dating back to the January 2008 Sony Open in Hawaii. The streak of 33 was tied with Tiger Woods for the longest current streak on tour.

Dustin Johnson played with Brian Gay in the first two rounds and watched Gay reach 9 under through 36 holes to take a one-shot lead into the weekend. He said all areas of Gay's game looked on and he predicted Gay would be tough to beat this weekend. It appears that way through nine holes of the third round. Gay has continued to play solid and barely make a mistake, making a pair of birdies on the front nine and building onto his lead.

Wind the players' nemesis Thursday at Harbour Town

It was a pleasant day for Thursday's opening round of the Verizon Heritage, with temperatures around 70 degrees and bright sunshine. It opened the door for some low scores. But a breeze that was consistently 15 mph and gusted to 25 mph or more gave players fits, particularly on the three closing holes along Calibogue Sound. Just ask Parker McLachlin and Buick Invitational and Honda Classic runner-up John Rollins both shot opening-round 80s. Rollins made three double bogeys and McLachlin shot a back-nine 41 and had three penalty strokes on three different holes. Trevor Immelman was ecstatic with a 5-under-par 66. ``[A 66] is a win, especially with this amount of breeze blowing,'' Trevor Immelman said. ``Winning score is never too far under par, so 5 under is a good start. You always expect wind here.''

Johnson off at 8:30 a.m. Thursday

Dustin Johnson of Myrtle Beach is teeing off at 8:30 a.m. Thursday off the 10th tee at Harbour Town Golf Links in the first round of the $5.7 million 41st Verizon Heritage. He's playing with Brian Gay and the highest-ranked player in the field, Paul Casey of England, who is ranked seventh in the Official World Golf Ranking. The group goes off the first tee at 1:10 p.m. in Friday's second round.
Johnson, who is 10th on the FedEx Cup points list and ninth on the 2009 PGA Tour money list with nearly $1.64 million earned, fell from 40th to 42nd in the world last week despite a tie for 30th in the $7.5 million Masters.
Tommy Gainey, a native of Darlington and resident of Bishopville who is playing this week on a sponsor exemption, is in the final group of the first round off the 10^th tee Thursday at 1:40 p.m. with James Driscoll and Mark Anderson, an amateur from Beaufort who played for the University of South Carolina and won the Players Amateur to earn a designated spot. They go off the first tee at 9 a.m. Friday.

Johnson matches Masters record, ties for 30th

AUGUSTA, Ga. | Dustin Johnson closed his first Masters experience with a final-round 73 at Augusta National Golf Club.
A ho-hum number, but hardly a ho-hum round.
Johnson put together perhaps the greatest three-hole stretch in Masters history Sunday.
He joined Dan Pohl as the only player in 73 Masters tournaments to eagle back-to-back holes. Johnson holed a 20-foot eagle putt on the 13th, then holed a 6-iron from 182 yards on the par-4 14th for another eagle. Pohl also eagled 13 and 14 in the third round in 1982.
Johnson added a two-putt birdie on the par-5 15th to play the three holes 13-15 5 under par.
``I was really excited. I was struggling,'' said Johnson, who was 6-over on his round through 12 holes. ``I made the eagle on 13, which helped out a lot, but eagling 14 got me going a little bit because I was a little bit down on myself. I definitely wasn't performing as well as I wanted to. That definitely gave me a little boost and gave me some energy to finish it off.''
Johnson made pars on the final three holes to tie for 30th at 1-under-par 287.
``I really enjoyed the week. I had a great time,'' he said. ``I thought for being my first time I fared okay. I played decent. I never really could get it going, though. I'm pretty happy with my play. Next year when I come back I think it will help me a lot. I really like the golf course.
``. . . I think this is a place I'll contend in the future, especially the more times I get to play it the better I'm going to get.''