Saturday, May 31st, 2008
CANTOUR STOP GETS BOOST
The prize pool for the Canadian Tour’s long-standing Winnipeg event was increased by $50,000 to $200,000, and the winner gets an invite to the PGA Tour’s RBC Canadian Open. It goes at the Pine Ridge Golf Club beginning July 17.
Saturday, May 31st, 2008
There is a slow but sure changing of the guard in American golf.
And it could reflect in the Ryder Cup selections.
Tiger Woods is still atop the mountain, and it could take years to reach him even with the most experienced sherpas. Phil Mickelson might be getting slightly taller from all that stretching, but he isn’t going anywhere soon.
The fresh blood includes players like Anthony Kim, a 22-year-old who showed his firepower this month by winning the Wachovia Championship by five shots with a record score.
It includes Brandt Snedeker, who flirted with 59 as a rookie, won in Greensboro and showed plenty of panache in his wild final round at the Masters.
Boo Weekley has game to go with his homespun charm. J.B. Holmes won for the second time in his career at the FBR Open and is just outside the top eight in U.S. qualifying. Sean O’Hair and D.J. Trahan, both in their 20s, now have two PGA Tour victories.
“We’ve had a turnover in American golf,” Mickelson said. “I think that we’ve got a lot of good, young players that are going to make the (Ryder Cup) team this year, and I think that last year’s Presidents Cup team had a real energy boost from those young players who were energetic and enthused and motivated to play well.
“I think we’ll have, hopefully, the same thing on this year’s Ryder Cup team.”
Not to be forgotten is Paul Azinger, who directed the PGA of America to overhaul the qualifying system, now has four captain’s picks. European players expect him to go with experience, but Azinger is unpredictable. He showed a glimpse of that last year when asked whom he would take if he were Presidents Cup captain. He offered Holmes and Bubba Watson, with instructions to hit driver on every hole except for the par 3s.
Azinger wants the hot hand. No experience required, only trophies.
“Hal Sutton said it took a generation to get into this mess, and it will take a generation to get out of it,” Azinger said.
The mess is Europe has captured the Ryder Cup eight of the last 11 times.
MONTY STILL ON EURO RADAR
European Ryder Cup captain Nick Faldo thinks he’ll have a spot for Colin Montgomerie on this year’s team, if Monty can pull out of a recent slump that has seen him fall to 90th in the world rankings.
Saturday, May 31st, 2008
Annika Sorenstam will compete in the CN Canadian Women’s Open as part of her farewell tour.
The 37-year-old Swede, who announced last week she plans to retire at the end of the season, said Tuesday she intends to play at the Ottawa Hunt and Golf Club on Aug. 14.
Sorenstam confirmed the news at a charity event at the Magna Golf Club north of Toronto.
Sorenstam has won 72 tournaments in her career, including 10 majors and a career Grand Slam.
Tuesday, May 27th, 2008
“ö Jim Hickson, May 6, Niakwa, fifth hole, 150 yards, 7-iron.
“ö Sam Matsuo, May 6, Pine Ridge, 10th hole, 179 yards, 4-hybrid.
“ö Abe Elias, April 30, Shooters, sixth hole, 84 yards, 9-iron.
“ö Michael Grimes, April 24, Pebble Beach Golf Links, 17th hole, 5-hybrid.
Don McNiell, April 19, Niakwa, 14th hole, 100 yards, PW
Dal McCloy, Feb. 24, Rio Verde CC, 14th hole, 173 yards, 5-iron.
Terry Lang, Feb. 2, Huntington Hills GCC Florida, 14th hole, 144 yards, 4-hybrid.
Celia Farough, Dec. 18, Pecan Valley, third hole, 108 yards, 4-iron
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Monday, May 26th, 2008
It’s early for local competitive events, but the Leaf Junior Golf Tour isn’t wasting any time with the first of its scheduled four events for the province in 2008.
The MJT Season Opener is slated for today and Sunday at The Meadows Golf Club just northeast of the city.
Players from 10 to 20 are eligible.
The next MJT event in the province is scheduled for June 14-15 at South Interlake.
Monday, May 26th, 2008
Change has also been a buzzword for the Royal Canadian Golf Association in recent times.
It has landed its title sponsor for the national open. The RBC Canadian Open takes place, as mentioned above, in late July.
And in salvaging our Open’s future, the RCGA has had to change the way it does business. The $5 million PGA Tour event will now be its own self-sustaining property and the funds that had always flowed from its success to help the RCGA conduct its business will now come from elsewhere.
Since the Open deal with RBC came into effect, the RCGA has condensed its staff and begun to examine every facet of its existence under new executive director Scott Simmons.
Productivity, usefulness to its members and potential to be either worthy or self-supporting are the colours of the glasses being worn in the review of everything.
In keeping with that theme, some changes have appeared on the 2008 competitive schedule of national amateur championships. Two tournaments have been dropped altogether, the Canadian Club Champions’ Championship (not accomplishing what it was designed to do) and the Canadian Senior Match Play Championship (redundant and frivolous).
And the Canadian men’s amateur has changed format. It will be a popular move among the best players to drop the match-play format used since 1995, a format that has brought some unusual winners, to say the last.
Moving back to stroke play over 72 holes is almost certain to identify the best player and while it’s not tradition that’s being kept (the Amateur was match play from 1895-1968, as well as since 1995), and it’s not following the USGA’s format, it’s far more important in our eyes to get the best winner.
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Monday, May 26th, 2008
The Free Press Manitoba Classic, July 17-20 at Pine Ridge Golf Club, is about to morph into a new kind of event on the Tour. Organizers, sponsors and the Tour are putting the finishing touches on the details and expect to announce them in the next few days.But it’s already known that the event will get a new name and new prominence on the Tour’s schedule by enjoying a substantial purse increase from its current $150,000, possibly as high as $200,000.
And what will be a major carrot to top players, both Canadian and international, will be the perk for the winner — not just a fat first-place cheque but also an automatic spot in the RBC Canadian Open. That US$5-million PGA Tour event takes place the following week at Glen Abbey Golf Club in Oakville, Ont.
The optics of all the modifications to Manitoba’s event are positive. It elevates the Canadian Tour’s standing in the eyes of its fellow tours. It’s a solid shot of adrenaline to the event here when other news from the past, while not necessarily negative, has been challenging because it’s not considered ideal to be backed farther into July to go head-to-head with the British Open, or to butt up against Canadian Open week, and it certainly isn’t any easier getting volunteers so essential to any tournament the deeper you go into summer vacation time.
Not to mention it’s always important to feel rewarded for being one of the Canadian Tour’s cornerstone events.
Monday, May 26th, 2008
The 2008 North American Indigenous Games will be held from Aug. 3-10 in Cowichan Valley, B.C., and Manitoba plans to send a team of 500 athletes, coaches, managers and training staff to compete in this most prestigious competition.
There are 16 sports at the 2008 NAIG, but in order to best use the resources available and allow 500 participants to travel to the Games, Manitoba is participating in only 12 sports – Archery, Athletics (track and field), Box Lacrosse, Soccer, Badminton, Golf, Softball, Canoeing, Volleyball, Basketball, Baseball and Swimming. Manitoba will not compete in boxing, wrestling, tae-kwon-do or rifle shooting.
However, Manitoba will send a bantam female team – that’s 13-14-year-old girls – and one of the players who earned a spot on the team was Richard, the 12-year-old daughter of the team’s head coach Justin Richard.
At first, no one in Manitoba expected a problem allowing a 12-year-old to play with 13-14-year-olds as long as the young woman was physically ready to play. During tryouts it was clear that Raine Richard could handle herself playing against older children.
And besides, in almost every case presented to a national or international sports governing body, allowing children to play “up” or with older kids has always been permitted.
“We all know that older kids can’t play ‘down’ against younger kids, that wouldn’t be fair,” said MASRC executive director Kurt Kelly, who pleaded Richard’s case before the NAIG Council. “But every where we looked, younger children ciould play against older children if they were capable.
“In this case, one of our best coaches had decided to keep a 12-year-old on his team. We couldn’t see a problem.”
Saturday, May 17th, 2008
t’s a good idea to spend time, energy and money on young stars with the talent and drive to become world-class golfers, but not at the expense of the other kids in your club’s junior program, Henry Brunton says.Those 37 kids may not have as much golfing ability, but research shows they, too, enjoy competing and, if given support, will remain keen golfers and draw other people to the sport, he adds.
“They’re the people that will move the needle in golf,” says Brunton, an Ottawa-area native and former Rideau View assistant who is now the Royal Canadian Golf Association national men’s team coach, a successful Toronto-area teaching pro and, since earlier this year, holder of Master Professional status from the Canadian Professional Golfers’ Association.
The final step in obtaining that status was defending a paper entitled “The Development of Expertise for Elite Competitive Golfers and the Related Probability of Advancing to the PGA Tour — Key Information for Athletes, Parents, Coaches, Golf Professionals and Administrators,” which Brunton submitted to the CPGA membership and education committee last June.
Struck by the increasing challenge of managing the expectations of young golfers he works with, and their parents, in a healthy way, Brunton says there’s too often one disparity between a young player’s actual level of performance and where they think they are, and another between where they think they’ll be in 24 to 36 months and the amount of work needed to get there.
Thus, his paper, which can be downloaded from cpga.com (look under “News” from January 2008), begins with an examination of the chances of reaching world-class status and becoming a PGA Tour member.
The numbers are daunting. For example, of 52 different Canadian junior boys’ champions between 1938 and 2000, only Jim Rutledge and the late George Knudson earned PGA Tour cards, and winning a Canadian junior title is itself a rare feat.
Further, Brunton’s paper points out that, since the modern PGA Tour formed in 1968, the only provinces to produce members are British Columbia, Ontario, Manitoba and Quebec, and the only Quebec-born player to make it was Jerry Anderson.
“The Ottawa Valley has a lot of great players, but, if Brad (Fritsch) and Lee (Curry, both on the affiliated Nationwide Tour) make it, they’ll be the first,” Brunton says.
So how can Canada best nurture the next Mike Weir while also looking out for the common amateur golfer?
Drawing on several research sources, including work by Dr. Jean Côté of Queen’s University, Brunton says early specialization in golf can lead to injury, burnout and dropping out of the sport.
It’s better to allow children to try many sports during the “sampling” years (ages 6-12) before narrowing fields of play during the “specializing” years (13-15) and allowing them to make a decision to become an elite golfer at the “investment” stage (16-plus) by devoting large chunks of leisure time to training.
Weir played youth hockey, Brunton notes, while Tiger Woods dabbled in baseball, tennis and other sports before becoming the world’s dominant male golfer.
“Across the board, this is the way that elite golfers or elite athletes develop to the point where we come to know their names,” Brunton says.
A key factor separating “sampling” from “specializing” and “investment” is the amount of “deliberate practice,” which is defined as being engaged in activities specifically designed to improve performance with full concentration.
It increases with age, in contrast to the decline in “deliberate play,” which can be described as neighbourhood play using the general rules of the game without being in an organized league. Think of it as free play, such as pickup basketball, road hockey or skipping over to the golf course to play a few holes after school. Adults are around only to supervise for safety reasons and not to impose rules of competition.
Brunton’s prescription for the game also includes delaying “high-profile, high-pressure” tournaments and tours for juniors until age 13, creating a new junior golf system to accommodate the “sampling, specializing” and “investment” stages, and developing an industry-wide strategy to identify and serve youngsters whose priority is having fun within the sport, perhaps with something akin to “house league” competition.
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/sports/story.html?id=cbff5475-4705-4968-afd2-5ac52326be29
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Saturday, May 17th, 2008
It’s a good idea to spend time, energy and money on young stars with the talent and drive to become world-class golfers, but not at the expense of the other kids in your club’s junior program, Henry Brunton says.
Those 37 kids may not have as much golfing ability, but research shows they, too, enjoy competing and, if given support, will remain keen golfers and draw other people to the sport, he adds.
“They’re the people that will move the needle in golf,” says Brunton, an Ottawa-area native and former Rideau View assistant who is now the Royal Canadian Golf Association national men’s team coach, a successful Toronto-area teaching pro and, since earlier this year, holder of Master Professional status from the Canadian Professional Golfers’ Association.
The final step in obtaining that status was defending a paper entitled “The Development of Expertise for Elite Competitive Golfers and the Related Probability of Advancing to the PGA Tour — Key Information for Athletes, Parents, Coaches, Golf Professionals and Administrators,” which Brunton submitted to the CPGA membership and education committee last June.
Struck by the increasing challenge of managing the expectations of young golfers he works with, and their parents, in a healthy way, Brunton says there’s too often one disparity between a young player’s actual level of performance and where they think they are, and another between where they think they’ll be in 24 to 36 months and the amount of work needed to get there.
Thus, his paper, which can be downloaded from cpga.com (look under “News” from January 2008), begins with an examination of the chances of reaching world-class status and becoming a PGA Tour member.
The numbers are daunting. For example, of 52 different Canadian junior boys’ champions between 1938 and 2000, only Jim Rutledge and the late George Knudson earned PGA Tour cards, and winning a Canadian junior title is itself a rare feat.
Further, Brunton’s paper points out that, since the modern PGA Tour formed in 1968, the only provinces to produce members are British Columbia, Ontario, Manitoba and Quebec, and the only Quebec-born player to make it was Jerry Anderson.
“The Ottawa Valley has a lot of great players, but, if Brad (Fritsch) and Lee (Curry, both on the affiliated Nationwide Tour) make it, they’ll be the first,” Brunton says.
So how can Canada best nurture the next Mike Weir while also looking out for the common amateur golfer?
Drawing on several research sources, including work by Dr. Jean Côté of Queen’s University, Brunton says early specialization in golf can lead to injury, burnout and dropping out of the sport.
It’s better to allow children to try many sports during the “sampling” years (ages 6-12) before narrowing fields of play during the “specializing” years (13-15) and allowing them to make a decision to become an elite golfer at the “investment” stage (16-plus) by devoting large chunks of leisure time to training.
Weir played youth hockey, Brunton notes, while Tiger Woods dabbled in baseball, tennis and other sports before becoming the world’s dominant male golfer.
“Across the board, this is the way that elite golfers or elite athletes develop to the point where we come to know their names,” Brunton says.
A key factor separating “sampling” from “specializing” and “investment” is the amount of “deliberate practice,” which is defined as being engaged in activities specifically designed to improve performance with full concentration.
It increases with age, in contrast to the decline in “deliberate play,” which can be described as neighbourhood play using the general rules of the game without being in an organized league. Think of it as free play, such as pickup basketball, road hockey or skipping over to the golf course to play a few holes after school. Adults are around only to supervise for safety reasons and not to impose rules of competition.
Brunton’s prescription for the game also includes delaying “high-profile, high-pressure” tournaments and tours for juniors until age 13, creating a new junior golf system to accommodate the “sampling, specializing” and “investment” stages, and developing an industry-wide strategy to identify and serve youngsters whose priority is having fun within the sport, perhaps with something akin to “house league” competition.
“If they’re not among the chosen few (who qualify for the PGA Tour),” Brunton says, “all their experience and training in golf will transfer to other parts of life.”
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/sports/story.html?id=cbff5475-4705-4968-afd2-5ac52326be29
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