I was absolutely blown away when I saw these pictures. It looks surreal and I can only imagine some of the wicked bounces you will see here. Who's up for that golf trip to China?
Karrie Webb won her 37th LPGA tournament today. Her 52nd career tournament victory.
Karrie Webb. Getty Images
Karrie Webb must surely be Australia's best golfer ever. She beat Japan's Chie Arimura for a one-shot victory at the HSBC Women's Championship in Singapore today. (See video highlights courtesy of FoxSports below).
Going into the back nine tied with Yani Tseng and trailing by one, she needed something special. Given Yani Tseng's year, everyone expected her to win the tournament. A string of four birdies starting at the 11th sealed the win for Webb however, with only a par needed on the last for victory.
So does everyone agree? Australia's best golfer ever?
Jason Day and Geoff Ogilvy have won their second round matches at the Accenture Match Play.
Jason Day was red hot against Paul Casey and beat one of the favourites for this event, 4 and 2. Casey has made the final of the Accenture Match Play in the previous two years but Day has found form after a poor week in LA. He now faces J.B. Holmes who beat Ernie Els, 1up. Holmes has yet to trail in his two matches. If Day can keep firing those irons in at pins and get an early lead, we may just see Day in the the quarter finals.
Prediction: Day 1up
Australia's most reliable golfer, Geoff Ogilvy beat Thomas Bjorn, 1up. Neither of these guys played great golf with plenty of birdies interspersed with plenty of bogeys. Ogilvy won with a par on the last but this format is just about beating your opponent. Ogilvy has some work to do in the next round though. He faces Bubba Watson who demolished Mark Wilson 6 and 5.
Just two Australians are left in the Accenture Match Championship after the first round which also saw reigning champ Ian Poulter bundled out by Stewart Cink. We preview their second round matches below. But first up, here are the Aussie winners and losers from the first round.
Preview of the first round matches for the Aussies in the field:
Note: The Aussies playing this week with the best form, all came back to play in Australia at the end of 2010.
Robert Allenby v Ross Fisher (England)
Allenby has got to be liking this first up match given his recent form. Gone is the claw grip and his old putting style has returned to good effect. Fisher has been steady so far this year without shooting the lights out. Allenby to win this one.
Six Australian golfers are part of the 64-man field to start in this week's WGC Matchplay event. The six best Australian golfers - Adam Scott, Robert Allenby, Geoff Ogilvy, Jason Day, Richard Green and Brendan Jones have all qualified to play in the head-to-head knock-out event as members of the best 64 golfers in the world.
The Accenture Matchplay Championship is possibly the most interesting golf tournament to watch on television. You get five days of matchplay golf (on One HD) featuring the best 64 players in the world. what more could you want. The PGA Tour website is even offering a printable bracket sheet so you can follow along at home and fill in the scores as you go! FTW!
The format for event is knockout matchplay which has meant you are left with only eight golfers for the weekend's action. the final match was always played over 36 holes on the Sunday which was often an anti-climax. The tournament schedule has been tweaked a little this year with the final no longer being played over 36 holes. The final day will now feature both the semi-final and the final matches of 18 holes each.
Despite the tweaks, the tournament is still flawed.
The cut throat format means a golfer can be out of the tournament after 18 holes of golf, or often less. Álvaro Quirós only played 12 holes before being beaten by Mike Weir last year. I wonder whether a couple of days of stroke play might be a good compromise (similar to the Surf Coast Knockout tournament) to determine the top 32 or 16 players to play over the final three days.
One of the most enjoyable golf tournaments to watch on TV comes our way this week in the form of the Accenture World Matchplay. The best golfers in the world play match-play golf at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Club in Arizona once again and One HD have live coverage each morning.
Golf and skateboarding don't usually go together but an Australian pro-golfer is combining both of them on his property near Phillip Island, nicknamed MegaRanch.
The generalisation about golfers is that they are stuffy, conservative types but Australian professional Peter Wilson is far from it. He has had a good summer on the golf course, playing well at the Australian Open in Sydney, a Top-10 at the Victorian Open and he made the final knock-out stage of the Surf Coast Knockout in Torquay. But he is as comfortable in the surf or on the skateboard, as he is on the golf course.
Three years ago he staged his own golf tournament at Flinders Golf Course which also featured a skateboarding competition on the biggest vertical ramp seen in Australia. Positioned between the 1st and 18th holes, the event attracted over 5000 people despite terrible wet weather.
It was at this event that Wilson offered up his property as the perfect venue for a proposed mega jump ramp. Already boasting a putting green and a short game golf course, the chance to add a mega skate ramp would compliment them nicely.
Megaranch short game course
Work on the "Big-Air" ramp is well under way. When completed, plenty of skateboarding stars have been lined up to compete in its opening event which will also feature nearest the pin competitions running in parallel.
You can get feel for what its like to skate the ramp in the video below. Check out the Megaranch website for more details.
Aaron Baddeley has become the first Australian to win on the PGA Tour in 2011 with a two-stroke victory at Riviera Country Club Club in California.
Baddeley played near flawless golf to win the Northern Trust Open and beat a resurgent Vijay Singh by two shots. His only mistake all day was when he double-bogeyed the 13th hole but re-cemented his position at the top of the leaderboard with an amazing, curling birdie putt on the 14th that no one, perhaps not even Baddeley saw coming.
I switched over to the European Tour golf last night and was immediately greeted with Thongchai Jaidee smacking golf balls into a light pole, which you can see in the video below courtesy of the European Tour.
The Avantha Masters being played at the DLF and Country Club has floodlights on the golf course and Thongchai Jaidee hit one with his tee shot. He asked for a free drop away from the pole which the rules official declined.
In an attempt to make a point, he hit two very strange and dangerous golf shots straight into the light pole. They rebounded back past his head and out-of-bounds. He eventually played his seventh shot up to the green before an on course commentator alerted Jaidee to the local rules: any player hitting any of the floodlights must reply the shot, with no penalty.
Jaidee went back to the tee and to once again hit his first tee shot - which he sliced way right.
It is another case of a professional golfer not knowing the local rules. If the commentator had not mentioned anything, he may have been disqualified from the tournament had he not replayed his tee shot before starting the next hole.
The major golf brands have been trying to counter the huge market for fake golf clubs that continue to rip off consumers across the globe. I know several golfers who have unwittingly bought fake golf clubs in the false belief they were the genuine product for a big name company.
In a world first, Callaway Golf Australia are fighting back with the launch of a major Anti-Counterfeiting initiative as part of their Callaway Golf South Pacific branch. They have introduced a certified authentic label on all of their golf clubs released across Australia and New Zealand. The unique labels, when viewed using a polarised filter, can be used be retailers and consumers to validate the authenticity from certified resellers of the Callaway brand.
Tiger Woods and Sergio Garcia. Photo by Ross Kinnaird/Getty Images
I've been avoiding this. Mainly because it bores me but also because it is obviously, and unequivocally a bad look. It only adds to the demise of Tiger Woods as a role model for golf and to the now endless list of stories about him which aren't just about his golf game.
I mentioned it briefly on Twitter, but readers of Aussie Golfer keep bringing the situation up. So just a few comments.
I wonder if the days of playing one course over and over are gone. Traditionally, being a member of a golf club meant you played your own golf course every weekend. Only rarely would you play a different golf course in a competition environment.
Open days are are now a dime a dozen. The opportunity to play different Australian golf courses is as tempting and as simple as ever. The green fees on these open days are often great value with some great prizes on offer.
Here is another incentive to win a professional golf tournament. Australian golfer Marcus Fraser won the 2010 Ballantines Championship in Korea and one of the perks that go with that is teaming up with Ballantine's to create a special Scotch whisky for this year's event.
And I thought you just grab your winner's cheque and drive away!
Don't expect to find the blend on the shelves at Dan Murphy's though. The blend contains whiskies that are all at least 38 years old; only 10 bottles are being produced. One bottle is presented to Fraser and a second bottle goes to the winner of this year's Ballantine's Championship winner. As yet, no word on whether Aussie Golfer is sent a bottle.
A short video of the process is added below but for extra points (and I love a quiz), why is whisky spelled without an 'e' in this article?
The following video is courtesy of the European Tour which played it numerous times over the course of the weekend's action from the Omega Dubai Desert Classic.
Of course there was plenty of good golf action including rise and demise of Tiger Woods, the grouping of the world's top three players together and the victory by Alvaro Quiros. But it is this video that sticks in my mind.
It is kind of scary how quickly the city of Dubai in the background to the Emirates Golf Club has been erected.
Peter O'Malley is auctioning off a chance to caddie for him at the Queensland PGA Championship to be played at the City Golf Club in Toowooba.
The golf course was severely damaged by the recent floods but has recovered well enough to hold the event. O'Malley has decided to auction off carrying his bag to raise additional funds for the Queensland floods relief effort.
The highest bidder carries his bag for the tournament and also receives a whole load of championship merchandise and framed memorabilia item to commemorate the occasion.
The 2011 Cellarbrations QLD PGA Championship to be played from Thursday 24th to Sunday 27th February. The auction page is being held over at ebay and final bidding closes at 5pm on Friday 19th February.
Yani Tseng with the ANZ Ladies Masters trophy. Source
Yani Tseng was ranked fifth best female golfer in the world when she arrived in Australia recently and had aspirations to one day be number one. It only took two weeks to do so by winning last week's Australian Open and today capturing the ANZ Ladies Masters. At just 22-years-old she is the youngest female golfer to do so since the inception of the Rolex Rankings.
Got some extra Christmas money left over? Thinking about buying new clubs? You should really try them first at demo days for big golf brands at your local driving range or golf club.
They will have representatives on site to assist without being too pushy as you can't usually purchase the clubs on the day.
Here is a list of demo days from the big names that have Australian golf demo days listed on their websites:
A reader recently asked me what the ruling is if your golf ball splits in two? One piece sails in to a water hazard and the other piece lands in the fairway.
My first reaction was to question what standard of golf ball was being used as this very rarely happens any more. Twenty years ago it was fairly common to find a few half golf balls lying around a golf course but the quality of the modern golf ball is generally very good.
But let's just consider the scenario for a minute...
John Daly showed off his new golf bag to the world yesterday via his Twitter account. No doubt it will be good for advertising revenue but how good would it be to see John Daly do the Dangerfield dance (see video below) in the middle of the Pebble Beach Pro-Am this week?! If there are a few slow players in front of him and we're half a chance to see it.
The Presidents Cup is set for Melbourne in November with the USA and International teams to be decided later in the year. But a quick look at the current standings shows one glaring omission: international team captain Greg Norman is yet to choose his second assistant.
Given the USA team have Michael Jordan, may I make a crazy suggestion – Shane Warne.
All the best Australian golfers do an extraordinary amount of work for charity and the underprivileged. The work by Stuart Appleby and Robert Allenby for example, is understated and incredible. Adam Scott has been back in Australia over the past few weeks and has taken time out to raise money for the Queensland flood relief.
Adam Scott took part in the Battle of the Stars celebrity golf tournament last week at Gainsborough Greens to help raise funds for the flood relief efforts. One lucky punter paid over $5,000 for a round of golf with him at the event which included a whole load of celebrities including Mat Rogers, Karmichael Hunt and Dick Johnson. You can catch a few shots of the day in the photos below.
Today he is playing 100 holes of golf!
Adam is on course at the Avondale Golf Club today for the Marathon Golf Day raising money for his foundation which supports disadvantaged kids. The work done by many Australia's top golfers is underrated and often forgotten.
The ANZ Ladies Masters tees off at Royal Pines Resort this weekend and after Yani Tseng's dominant performance at the Australian Open last week, can anyone else expect to win?
Yani Tseng was just flawless last week. Her confidence was huge and attacked every pin on the course foir most of the tournament. She must go into this tournament as favourite but it is worth keeping in mind what happened last year. In 2010 she also won the Australian Open but then went on to struggle at Royal Pines, finishing 14 shots behind the winner, Karrie Webb.
The Ladies Masters is the brain child of Bob Touhy and his company who have staged the event since 1990. He enticed American Jane Geddes to come out and play that year as one of the marquee players. She not only came out to play but won the first two tournaments which were originally held at Palm Meadows.
The event has been held at Royal Pines Resort ever since and Touhy has been proactive in enticing the best young talent in the world each year. In 1992 Touhy invited a youg Karrie Webb to play in the tournament, and in 2006 he invited amateur star Amy Yang to play. She surprised everyone and won the event in a playoff.
Yani Tseng totally dominated the field at the Handa Australian Open yesterday to claim victory for the second year in a row. She finished the day at the Commonwealth Golf Club at 16-under par - seven strokes clear of Eun-Hee Ji, Melissa Reid and world number one, Jiyai Shin.
Taiwanese born Tseng was all class in some trying conditions yesterday, attacking every pin no matter how hard the wind blew. She climbed back to number two in the world according to the Rolex Rankings and based on that performance, it appears only a matter of time before she claims the top ranked position. Indeed it is hard to believe that Yani Tseng has not yet been number one in the world. She rose to number two in the world in 2010 winning two of the four major championships and was awarded the 2010 LPGA player of the year.
Interestingly, last year she was reportedly offered a five year sponsorship deal with an unnamed Chinese company last year. She declined the offer as one of the requirements meant she must change her citizenship from Taiwanese to Chinese.
IMG, Tiger Woods' management company and owners of the Australian Masters are reportedly planning a rebel golf tournament in Melbourne for the week preceding the 2011 Presidents Cup. If rumours are true, they are set to fracture Australian professional golf like never before.
IMG are yet to make any statement after the Australian Masters was snubbed by the Australasian Tour which awarded the prized week before the Presidents Cup to the Australian Open in Sydney. A further slap in the face to IMG came when the Australian PGA event at Coolum was scheduled for the week following the Presidents Cup.
Jarrod Lyle sent tens of thousands of fans crazy on Friday by hitting a hole-in-one on the infamaous party hole at the Phoenix Open. Check out the video of the hole-in-one below.
"Of all the holes in the world to have a hole-in-one on, this is probably the best you can think of," Lyle said after he signed his scorecard. "I probably looked like a complete moron carrying on down there. But it’s just one of those things. I think the crowd kind of spurs you on a little bit and I was trying to spur the crowd a little bit too to make it as loud as possible."
This was Lyle's first career hole-in-one and what a place to do it. The 16th at Scottsdale is surrounded everyday by tens of thousands of partying golf fans.
"So I just carried on and cheered and screamed and I think I dropped a naughty word up there. I was just so excited I didn’t realize the camera was about three feet in front of my face. There might be a letter in my locker next week. I don’t know."
Check out the video for yourself. His 'naughty' reaction is priceless. Couldn't have happened to a nicer bloke.
Geoff Ogilvy is back on the PGA Tour this week at the Waste Management Phoenix Open. The nasty cut on his finger has healed sufficiently to get him back on the golf course. But this is one rowdy tournament to start the year.
The TPC Scottsdale course features the infamous par-3 16th; the craziest, loudest hole in professional golf. Each year the hole is decked out with grandstands to completely surround the hole and allow viewing for 35,000 people. Most are drinking and having one massive party.
Geoff Ogilvy describes the hole and the associated "not sensible" atmosphere in the video below. I've also added a slightly hyped up preview of what you may expect at the 16th.
You would think a guy with the nickname "The Mechanic" would be fixing things, not breaking them.
Last week at the Volvo Masters, Miguel Angel Jiminez was having a rough time on the greens and threw his putter at his bag in disgust and broke it in the middle of the round. Unable to play with a club not broken in the act of playing a shot, he was forced to putt with his lob wedge for the final five holes. It worked wonders as he needed only 7 more 'putts' for the round including a stretch of three straight birdies.
In the video below, Darren Clarke made sure the incident did not go unnoticed, Monty makes a gag and Jiminez seems like he was a pretty good sport about it.
Which Aussie golfer can play a golf shot from an escalator?
Last week we took a look at the best Australian golfers right now with an eye on the Presidents Cup later this year. But with the Handa Women's Australian Open and the ANZ Ladies Masters scheduled for the coming weeks, who are Australia's best female golfers?
Karrie Webb once ruled world golf for many years and is arguably Australia's greatest ever golfer. There are a few other Australian women now challenging her for the title of Australia's best female golfer with four more in the world's top 100 golfers according to the Rolex Rankings. Let's take a look at who they are according to the rankings right now and see which one of them can play a shot from an escalator.
The Women's Handa Australian Open is being held this week at the Commonwealth Golf Club in Melbourne featuring a very strong field including World Number 1 Jiyai Shin, defending champion Yani Tseng and former champions Karrie Webb and Laura Davies.
Keep a close eye on Lexi Thompson too. The 16-year old American is back for her second Australian Open after a year which saw her win over US$300,000 in only seven starts on the LPGA Tour last year. She has been touted as the next big thing in women's golf.
Here is what you need to know about the tournament:
Now here is an Australian golf tournament making the best of the latest technology. The Handa Australian Open has released its very own iPhone app for this week's event at Commonwealth Golf Club.
The app contains live scores, full draws, event information, course guides and news feeds. Included is a course guide and a bird's eye view of every hole.
ABC TV are covering the Handa Women's Australian Open this week with sports presenter Stephanie Brantz fronting the broadcast. ABC1 will cover all four days from the Commonwealth Golf Club, Melbourne with Brantz joined by commentator Steve Robilliard and fairway commentator Ozzie Moore.
