From The BBC

England’s Ross Fisher hit a course record nine-under-par 63 in the opening round of the European Open to take a two-shot lead at The London Club.

In windy conditions, the 27-year-old finished with six successive birdies to break Seve Ballesteros’ course record.

Northern Ireland’s Graeme McDowell and 48-year-old South African David Frost are two behind on seven under.

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From GOLF.com

The Ryder Cup is a little more than two months away and there is no buzz. No one is talking about it and no one is writing about it. It used to be included in just about every final-round game story written in the United Kingdom from January on. Not this year. I guess when you have back-to-back blowout snoozers, it’s not big news anymore.

While we’re still two major championships away from the Ryder Cup at Valhalla in Louisville, Ky., let’s take a look at how the U.S. lineup is shaking out. Let’s just assume the points list is final now. Here’s who would be on the team:

Phil Mickelson. He won twice this year but fell flat on his face in his big home-game Open at Torrey Pines. With Tiger Woods out with a knee injury, he’s the only guy in the lineup who’s sure to play in all five matches… even though his recent Ryder Cup performances haven’t been all that stellar.

Stewart Cink. He’s been the most consistent U.S. player this season and finally got on the board with a victory recently in Hartford. He’s been a solid match-play performer. He wiped out Sergio Garcia in singles in the last Ryder Cup, one of the few American highlights.

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From GOLF.com

BETHESDA, Md. (AP) — Tiger Woods is still a candidate for drug testing, even though he will not be competing the rest of the year. But he already knows what to expect, having gone through private testing.

“I’ve done it twice, actually,” Woods said.

Why did he require two tests?

Woods didn’t say when the tests were conducted, but both came back negative. After the first test was clean, he said he changed the brand of amino acid as part of his nutrition program, and wanted to make sure the change didn’t alter the results. He said the second test came back negative, too.

STARTING OVER: Stacy Lewis got her professional career off to an amazing start.

Now she gets to start over.

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From Golfweek

By Rex Hoggard

BETHESDA, Md. – Five years from now – after having spent $5 million to prove golf’s cleanliness and answering 5 million questions about why drug testing hasn’t netted an offender, either high profile or otherwise – PGA Tour commissioner Tim Finchem will step to a podium and announce his circuit to be drug free.

That the Teflon Tour had to jump through all of the anti-doping hoops on the way to this above-it-all crossroads was a waste of time, money and character. But what’s a little smudge during the age of chemically induced asterisks?

However reluctantly the Tour was pushed, poked and prodded to the specimen cup, there is no escaping the commonly held belief that these guys are good and clean.

There was no need for all that heavy lifting and heavy spending to prove otherwise. But as Finchem figured Wednesday afternoon at the AT&T National, the likely site of the start of the anti-doping era, there was no way of ducking the doping cloud that has consumed other sports.

“With the highlight (of doping) in cycling and baseball in recent years, it’s become intense with the involvement of Capitol Hill in all sports of what they are doing in anti-doping,” said Finchem, the first to undergo testing at Congressional Country Club on Wednesday in order to learn how the process will impact his players. “We just felt we had to go down this road.”

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From USA Today

By Jerry Potter and Ted Bloch, USA TODAY

BETHESDA, Md. — K.J. Choi hopes there is no better cure to a spiraling season than playing in a tournament he won just a year ago.

After missing cuts in three of his last four starts, Choi’s Tuesday and Wednesday practice rounds at the AT&T National brought back a sense of familiarity and confidence to the South Korean who conquered the Congressional golf course last year.

 

A NEW ERA: PGA implements drug testing

“Every hole I remember exactly what (club) I played, what the situation was,” Choi says of Congressional Country Club. “I think it’s going to help me a lot this week.”

Choi began the season hot, winning the Sony Open in Hawaii on Jan. 13 to complement two other top-10 finishes on the year. But he stumbled at the Memorial, where he tied for 53rd in defense of his 2007 victory.

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From The Daily Express

TIGER WOODS has revealed he has been playing with a painful left knee for more than a decade and says he cannot wait to be operating on two good legs again.

US Open champion Woods said his anterior cruciate ligament, which was rebuilt a fortnight ago using a tendon from his hamstring, had always been weak and had finally snapped while jogging on a golf course a year ago.

He played on afterwards, winning two more Majors, until the situation became exacerbated by a stress fracture at Torrey Pines last month and he was booked in for surgery.

“My left knee has been sore for 10 to 12 years so it will be nice to finally have a healthy leg,” said Woods, who misses this month’s Open.

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From Golfweek

If this stage of the European season proves anything, it is that you write off experienced players at your peril, and you should beware of over-hyping a player after one good tournament.

Who would have thought defending champion Colin Montgomerie would arrive at the European Open as a bonafide contender for this week’s title? Certainly no one who saw him play in the U.S. Open, that’s for sure.

Monty shot 79-77 at Torrey Pines to miss the cut. Cue the inevitable whispers about the Scotsman no longer having the right stuff to contend at the highest level. Moreover, there were also questions about his ability to contend in run-of-the-mill European Tour events, as well.

There was good reason to be skeptical. Besides his misery at Torrey Pines in a tournament he once had his name written all over, Monty had much to ponder over his future on European fairways.

The Scot missed the cut at the European Tour’s flagship event, the BMW Championship, a tournament he won three years in succession from 1998-2000. He also placed 48th in the Irish Open and 70th in the Spanish Open. No wonder pundits were writing him off.

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From USA Today

By Tom LaMarre, The Sports Xchange

The Sports Xchange’s PGA Tour rankings, selected by TSX Golf Staff, are based on results from 2007 and 2008 — with more emphasis on recent performance.

1. Tiger Woods, United States — One week after undergoing surgery to repair his left anterior cruciate ligament, Woods hopes to be at Congressional in his role as tournament host of the AT&T National. Tournament director Greg McLaughlin was not sure if or how much Tiger will be able to participate this week because he probably will be on crutches with his knee in some type of cast, but he would like to be a presence at the tournament and some off-course events as well. The tournament benefits the Tiger Woods Foundation, which has created the Tiger Woods Learning Center in Anaheim, Calif., and another center is in the works in the Washington, D.C., area. Woods’ surgeon, Dr. Thomas Rosenberg, said after the surgery in Park City, Utah, that the No. 1 golfer in the world should make a complete recovery and have no lingering effects from the injury or the surgical procedure. Rosenberg has done surgery on Woods’ left knee four times since 1994, including 12 weeks ago for cartilage damage, but has indicated it should be as strong as ever following a lengthy rehabilitation process. No timetable was given for the duration of Woods’ absence from the game, but estimates have ranged from six months to one year. The Buick Invitational at Torrey Pines, where Woods claimed his seventh victory recently in the U.S. Open, is about seven months away.

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From Golf World

We’re still months away from the Ryder Cup (Sept. 19-21), but U.S. captain Paul Azinger might already have his spokesman for that week. “If Boo Weekley makes the team, he’s the man for the pressroom,” says Azinger. “The dude’s a quote a minute.” When Weekley was asked about the history of the Ryder Cup at last year’s PGA Championship, he responded, “I think Justin Leonard made a putt or something.” Great quotes aside, Azinger liked Weekley even before he won the Verizon Heritage in April to jump into sixth place in the points standings. The top-eight U.S. players make the team, plus four captain’s picks. “The main thing is,” Azinger

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From ESPN.com

It’s not every week a 19-year-old wins an LPGA major. Inbee Park’s victory at the U.S. Women’s Open was the first triumph by someone that young at a women’s major since … the beginning of June.

So how is it that the champions in the biggest women’s golf events of the year seem to get younger and younger while older players on the PGA Tour are able to pull out wins like 47-year-old Kenny Perry did at the Buick Open? And while on the topic of Perry, why exactly is he ditching his invite to the British Open in a few weeks? That one’s a real head-scratcher.ESPN.com golf writers Jason Sobel and Bob Harig discuss these age-old questions plus Perry’s travel itinerary choice and more in their weekly e-mail chat, Alternate Shot.

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From PGATour.com

Any guy can relate to the situation we found Kyle Thompson in the other day when we reached him on his cell. The rookie from South Carolina is an affable young man who can usually be found working on his game on the range as he attempts to make a second-half charge up the money list. But on this day, there were no buckets of balls being struck, no bunker shots being practiced or putts being sunk. Instead, Kyle and his bride of less than a year were shopping for, wait for it, sofas.

Kyle, what gives man?

PGATOUR.com: OK, we won’t tell anyone else. This is just between us. But how in the heck did you get dragged to a furniture store?

THOMPSON: (Laughs) Well, my wife travels with me on TOUR, helps me with all of my travel plans and logistics. The least I could do is to sometimes return the favor and help her find the right couch for our new house. Heck, our house needs some color so we’re looking for some good-looking furniture that will be a good fit.

PGATOUR.com: So, are you a sofa expert or do you just play one on TV?

THOMPSON: Man, I’m just along for the ride and trying to nod at the right times. We picked one out that was too big so now we’re looking for a smaller model.

PGATOUR.com: Hey, maybe you can make it over to Home Depot or Bed, Bath & Beyond like your boy Will Ferrell in Old School.

THOMPSON: I’ll get back to the driving range in the very near future. I’ve got plenty of fine tune so that’ll happen. But first things first.

PGATOUR.com: Seriously, Kyle, when you’re not practicing or walking through Ethan Allen, what’s the plan of attack?

THOMPSON: My wife and I are huge movie-goers. I don’t mean that we occassionally hit the movies. We’re always at the movies. We see everything that comes out. Even though we don’t have kids, we just saw Wall-E, which was great. We go out with some good friends on TOUR and see movies almost every weekend we’re on the road. Omar Uresti got me started on the movie train back on the Nationwide Tour and I’ve been going ever since.

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From GOLF365.com

Rocco Mediate, the American veteran who took Tiger Woods to a play-off in the US Open two weeks ago, is to play in next week’s Scottish Open at Loch Lomond.

The 45-year-old has not yet qualified for the following week’s Open at Royal Birkdale, but is on course to do so from a mini-money list on the US Tour which ends this Sunday.

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From PGATour.com

By John Maginnes

BETHESDA, Md. — Congressional Country Club, which is unquestionably the most American golf club in the country, is hosting Tiger’s event, the AT&T National, this week.

In addition to a who’s-who-of-the-beltway list of members, Congressional boasts six Commander in Chiefs in its storied history. Not real sure where Fluff Cowan fits in, but Jim Furyk’s caddy is a member there, too.

So why hasn’t an American-born player won here since Tom Weiskopf captured the U.S. Senior Open in 1995? Since then Ernie Els, Sergio Garcia and, most recently, K.J. Choi have hoisted various trophies at the feet of the glorious clubhouse to leave their American counterparts wanting.

This has been the summer of the American, though. Since Sergio took THE PLAYERS Championship and Ryuji Imada won the next week in Atlanta no foreign-born player has won on the PGA TOUR. My bet is for this trend to continue in the shade of the Capital here at Congressional.

* * *

When I think about Tiger Woods these days, I see him sitting around flipping channels and eating Hershey bars with his leg elevated. Oh, wait — that is what I would do on an average Monday and I have two good knees.

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From The Telegraph

Padraig Harrington was not exactly telling Nick Faldo how to go about his business although Europe’s Ryder Cup captain might well interpret things that way.

While giving his thoughts on this week’s European Open at the London Club, Harrington was asked if he deemed it important that Colin Montgomerie made Faldo’s side for Valhalla. “Personally,” Harrington said, “I’d want Monty on the team.”

There was nothing Faldo could object to in that, but it was then that the Open champion made a strong pitch for the role Montgomerie should be given if he does make the side. “I don’t think,” he ventured, “that you can bring Monty in and have him playing down in eighth place because that’s not going to work. He has to be in a position were you can bring him in and say, ‘Monty, you’re the playing captain and you’re out at No?1′.”

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From World Golf

NEW YORK — Golf Digest Publications announced today that Lorena Ochoa, the No. 1 ranked female golfer in the world, has joined the company exclusively as a playing editor. The long-term deal includes Ochoa’s contributions to both Golf Digest and Golf For Women.

According to the agreement, Ochoa will provide regular bylined instruction and feature content for the two magazines. Over the past year, Ochoa has contributed to both titles on a number of occasions and was on the cover of Golf For Women in the September/October 2007 issue. Ochoa will be featured on the cover of the August issue of Golf Digest, which hits newsstands on July 8.

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From The Golf Channel

By Brian Hewitt

If you detected a chill in the Minnesota air last Saturday when Inbee Park and Angela Park played in the same grouping—by the way, they’re not related—it was not just your imagination.

Inbee Park would win the U.S. Women’s Open the next day. Angela Park would finish in the top three for the second straight year. But afterward Don Brown, Angela Park’s coach, said that, sadly, Inbee and Angela are no longer best golfing friends.

Seems there was a falling out—between Angela’s parents and Inbee’s parents and it developed into something of a family feud that dragged the daughters into it. What was a very tight relationship between Angela and Inbee has suffered as a result.

When I asked Angela Park about this after the tournament, she was clearly uncomfortable with the subject. “It has been hard,” she said. “You never want to lose a friend. I have nothing against Inbee. We’re still young.”

When I asked Angela if their friendship could be restored in the future, she said she hoped so. Let’s hope so, too. Both women are just 19 years old.

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From freep.com

After driving through Canada, Justin Hicks arrived at the Ambassador Bridge to cross into Detroit at 12:45 a.m. Monday. He pulled up to the border agent and got the usual question.

“What were you doing in Canada?” the agent asked.

“I was playing in a golf tournament,” Hicks said.

“Well, how’d you do?” the agent asked.

“I won it,” Hicks said.

Suddenly, the agent became very interested.

“Are you kidding me?” he asked.

“No,” Hicks assured him, “I won the tournament.”

“What tournament was it?” the agent asked.

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From The Miami Herald

BY JEFF SHAIN

jshain@MiamiHerald.com

EDINA, Minn. –

She is still only 13 years old. Playing what even LPGA pros consider their toughest course of the year.Lexi Thompson doesn’t want to hear it.

”Not really,” the Coral Springs marvel said after missing last week’s U.S. Women’s Open cut, rolling her eyes for emphasis.

No, Thompson came to Interlachen Country Club with a purpose of seeing what an Open weekend felt like. And when it didn’t pan out, she was as unhappy as any other teenage girl would be to discover her mother took away her Myspace access.

Learning experience? Small steps? Not for Thompson.

”Go ahead and try. She doesn’t listen,” her father, Scott, said with a hint of exasperation.

Both of Lexi’s seasoned playing partners, he added, saw similar good-effort encouragement fall rather flat.

”I definitely expected a lot more this year,” Thompson said.

That is the drive Thompson possesses. Coaches across various sports will tell you it is better in the long run to teach an athlete with fire how to control it than to motivate one whose flame is low.

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From Canada.com

The last time Mike Weir was at Glen Abbey Golf Club, he was battling in a playoff with Vijay Singh for the championship of the 2004 Canadian Open. Weir lost a heartbreaker, and in the ensuing years, he wondered whether he would have a chance to tackle The Abbey in a Canadian Open again. Lacking a sponsor, saddled with a tough date and a weak field, Weir wondered how long the tournament would exist.

“Yes, I was worried that it could disappear,” he said, standing in the clubhouse at Glen Abbey on Monday as part of an event designed to introduce the Canadians in this year’s field. “Without a title sponsor there were a lot of questions.”

But Weir isn’t worried any more and many of those questions now have answers.

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From PGATour.com

Player: Kenny Perry
Current Rank: Third
Points: 15,933
Points earned in June: 9,990
The man has been playing out of his mind lately — and we all know what can happen when Perry gets on a hot streak. He’s had two wins and a playoff loss in his last six starts and currently trails Phil Mickelson by a mere seven points. Next up for him is the U.S. Bank Championship in Milwaukee and you’ve got to like his chances there, too. He won in 2003 and he’s got seven top-10s in his last eight starts. His Ryder Cup goal is all but realized, but don’t look for Perry to relax. He’s focused on that $10 million bonus.
• VIDEO: PGA TOUR Today reviews Perry win at the Buick Open

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From GOLF.com

Most right-handed amateurs aim too far to the right. Then, when they swing through, they come across their bodies to get the ball on line, which aggravates their slices, among other problems. Also, if you align your body to the right, you aim the clubface right, too.

To fix these faults, aim the face on the shot’s starting line. If you curve the ball, allow for that. Most of the time you will not be aiming at your end target. Then align your body parallel to that starting line.

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From GOLF.com

The tougher of the two shots above is the one with the ball sitting up, because you can slide the club right under it and whiff it. To hit this shot, you have to play the ball off your back foot and take a narrow stance with your knees straight. From there, make a simple sweeping motion, like a long putt. Rotate your body back and through, keeping your wrists firm and your legs quiet. If you shift your knees forward on the downswing, you’ll drive the club down and risk swinging under the ball. You want to clip it, not dig.

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